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THE GATE 
TO THE GOSPEL 



BY 

ELMER ELLSWORTH HELMS 



CINCINNATI 

JENNINGS AND GRAHAM 

NEW YORK 

EATON AND MAINS 



Bfo333 



copyright, 1913, by 
Jennings and Graham 



LC Control Number 




tmp96 031459 



9 far 

©CI.A350831 



John 3:16. 

"God so loved the world, that Re gave file 
Only begotten 

Son, that whosoever believetb in Rim should not 

Perish, but have 

Everlasting 

Life." 



Introduction 



I am glad to lift the latch of "The Gate to 
the Gospel." Luther said, "John 3: 16 is the 
Gospel in a nutshell." The founder of Meth- 
odism said John 3: 16 "is the Gospel in twenty- 
five words." If any reader has doubted it he 
will doubt it no more after reading these ten 
chapters on that supreme verse. 

In opening his memorable speech in reply to 
Hayne^ of South Carolina, January 26, 1830, 
Daniel Webster said, "When the mariner has 
been tossed for many days in thick weather and 
on an unknown sea, he naturally avails himself 
of the first pause in the storm, the earliest glance 
of the sun, to take his latitude and ascertain how 
far the elements have driven him from his true 
course." 

We live in the days of the critic. Every- 
thing is figurative now — even the birth and 
death and resurrection of our Lord- — and, of 
course, the miracles: Verily, the critics "have 
taken away my Lord and I know not where they 
have laid him." In the midst of the present- 
day fog and confusion and storm, this volume 
points to the Sun of Righteousness, and opens 
5 



Introduction 



for us again ' ' The Gate of the Gospel ' ' — the 
Gospel of John and Paul and Luther and Wesley 
and Simpson. And we discover, alas! how far 
foggy theological speculation has driven us from 
the true course. 

Eight years of my Episcopal life were spent 
at Buffalo, N. Y. Dr. Helms was a pastor in 
that beautiful city during those years, as he had 
been for some years before. I frequently at- 
tended his church. He was — and is — one of the 
most virile preachers of our day, a preacher of 
men to men. The church was always crowded 
on Sunday nights with men. These ten chap- 
ters give a hint as to the secret of his magnetic 
and successful ministry. 

Preachers and people will read this book with 
unmeasured profit, and reading, will be better 
and stronger. For here is found the real Gospel, 
the whole Gospel, without question or quibble, 
the Gospel of the very Son of God. Many a 
preacher could profitably read these chapters to 
his people, and among many of our people there 
would begin a real revival of real religion. For 
that is the passion of these pages. May God 
give them wings to waft them into thousands of 
homes and hearts! 

Joseph F. Berry. 
Episcopal Residence, Philadelphia, Pa. 



6 



Contents 



PAGE 

God, 9 

So Loved, 29 

The World, 47 

He Gave, 57 

Whosoever, 65 

Believeth, 77 

In Him, 85 

Perish, 95 

Life, 105 



The Conclusion of the Whole Matter, 117 



GOD 



"Lord of all being! throned afar, 
Thy glory flames from sun and star, 
Center and soul of every sphere, 
Yet to each loving heart how near! 

"Sun of our life, Thy quickening ray 
Sheds on our path the glow of day; 
Star of our hope, Thy softened light 
Cheers the long watches of the night. 

"Our midnight is Thy smile withdrawn. 
Our noontide is Thy gracious dawn; 
Our rainbow arch Thy mercy's sign; 
All, save the clouds of sin, are Thine! 

"Lord of all life, below, above, 
Whose light is truth, whose warmth is love, 
Before Thy ever-blazing throne 
We ask no luster of our own. 

"Grant us Thy truth to make us free, 
And kindling hearts that burn for Thee, 
Till all Thy living altars claim 
One holy light, one heavenly flame." 



"GOD" 

IT is generally agreed that there have been 
*■ seventeen great battles. We are now in the 
eighteenth, the battle of creeds — for and against. 
If a man wants to receive the plaudits of the 
crowd, all he needs to do is to pull out his little 
hatchet and go hacking at the great pyramid of 
creeds, and, after making a few chips fly, the 
populace cry, ' 1 Verily, the gods have come down 
among us." Soda water was always popular, 
and it is remarkable how people run after bub- 
bles, thinking they be diamonds. During the 
great laymen's National Missionary Conference 
a few years ago, while six thousand men were 
crowding into the great auditorium to discuss 
the carrying of the gospel to the last man, a 
bill-poster was tacking up placards at the en- 
trance to the hall, announcing that a certain 
free-thinker would speak there the following 
Sunday afternoon on "The Crumbling Creeds 
of Christianity." By actual count, just two 
hundred and ten people came to hear. The 
11 



^he Gate to the Gospel 



creeds of Christianity are not crumbling. Then, 
what is all this we hear? To condense steam 
into water is not to annihilate; to pour a precious 
liquid from a pitcher that is cracked into one 
that is whole, is not to pour it on to the ground. 
Really thoughtful men are not crying, "Down 
with creeds," though some of them may be ask- 
ing for a change from steam that scalds to water 
that satisfies, a change of form. Not "no creed," 
but a new pitcher for the elixir of life. 

Creed — what is creed? Credo, I believe. A 
man's creed is what he believes. There is no 
use discussing whether a man can live without 
a creed, for no man has ever lived without one. 
Every man has a creed. Even the poor atheist, 
who declares that of all men he is creedless, has 
the shallowest and smallest of creeds. Atheist — 
"a-theos" — "no God" — "I believe there is no 
God." God says, "He is a fool who says there 
is no God." It takes a fool to say it. That 's 
the creed of the atheist. A man's creed is simply 
what he believes — sometimes written, oftener 
not. 

The agnostic advertises his creed in the very 
word which he flings on his banner — "agnostic" 
12 



God 



— "don't know." " Agnostic, is there a God?" 
"Do n't know, doubt it." "Has man a soul?" 
"Do n't know, doubt it." "If he has a soul, is 
it immortal? " " Do n't know, doubt it." " Ag- 
nosticism" — do you know anything? Echo an- 
swers, "Do n't know, doubt it." 

It is not only impossible for a man to live 
without a creed, but creeds are all important. 
A man's creed is what a man believes. "As a 
man believeth, so is he." Creed makes char- 
acter. What a man believes molds him, makes 
him; alas! too often mars him. A creed is 
simply a condensed statement of what one 
believes. 

In Paris there is a statue of a knight, heavy 
armored, helmet on his head, a great shield 
leaning against him, a broadsword hanging by 
his side. Look on his face and you '11 never 
forget it. In his outstretched hands he is hold- 
ing a scroll, on which is one word, "Credo" — I 
believe. 'T was that that put that fire in his 
eye, that energy in his face, that swelled his 
body until it looked able to take a kingdom. 
No soldier is worthy to be called a soldier until 
he can cry, "I believe in my cause, my country, 
13 



^he Gate to the Gospel 



myself." Conduct reveals creed; creed deter- 
mines conduct; creed reveals character; creed is 
simply what a man believes. A Christian creed 
is simply taking the great teachings of the Bible 
and arranging them. So a Scriptural creed is 
simply a condensed Bible. If there is anything 
in your creed not in the Bible, then it is n't 
Christian. 

Do you want the best creed? That will 
meet your every need? That will never need 
revising? That is all complete, comprehensive, 
concise, condensed? That swallows up the 
Book from Genesis to Revelation? That crowds 
the Bible into one sentence, twenty-five words? 
Here it is, John 3: 16. Have you ever studied 
it? Behold in it God the Father, Jesus Christ 
the Son, the Holy Spirit, the fact of sin, man's 
lost condition, the plan of salvation, the atone- 
ment, Calvary, the great love of God, faith the 
connecting link between the human and divine, 
immortality, two eternal destinies — eternal life, 
eternal death. There are ten great fundamen- 
tals of the Christian religion; they are all in 
this verse. If you want a creed that you need 
and upon which you can stand, and having 
14 



God 



done all, stand, when the worlds go crash, here 
it is: 

It begins, "For God," and there you stop, 
for that staggers you. It is easier far to climb 
Mount Everest than that. Before you even be- 
gin the ascent you grow dizzy and faint. "God." 
Who ever climbed to the height of that word? 
Who ever got to the top of the first letter? 
Daniel Webster says, "There has never been 
but one thought that staggered me — ' God.' " 
"In the beginning" — motion? matter? mind? 
man? — Nay — ' 'God" — the sublimest word ever 
penned. "God is," the greatest sentence ever 
spoken. "God." Over that word more vol- 
umes have been written, more discussions waged, 
more theological, intellectual, scientific battles 
fought than over all other words. "God." 
Herbert Spencer spelled that word, "Unknow- 
able;" Goethe, "Unknown;" George Eliot, "In- 
conceivable;" Darwin, "Unthinkable;" Freder- 
ick Harrison, "the All-oneness." And then they 
have been disappointed that the world has n't 
rushed to the shadow of their definitions. These 
are no better than algebraic formulas. You can 
not pray to an algebraic formula; you can not 
15 



^he Gate to the Gospel 



worship a geometrical equation; you can not 
say, "X, Y, Z, help me, love me, make me one 
with thee." 

A materialistic scientist exclaims, "Did any 
one ever see God?" and then triumphantly re- 
torts, "No; then there is no God." Did any 
one ever see love? Then there is no love. Did 
any one ever see electricity? Then there is no 
electricity. Did any one ever see gravity, life, 
wind, sunlight? Is love knowable? Ask any 
mother. Is electricity knowable? By its 
phenomena, yes. Is life knowable? By its man- 
ifestations, yes. Is sunlight knowable? By its 
throb through the universe, yes. Is gravity 
knowable? Some slippery morning you venture 
out, and suddenly one foot is traveling north 
and the other south. What does that rump on 
the back of your head say? That gravity is 
knowable. 

Is God knowable? Yes and no. Honey is 
sweet; that is easy for the dullest to grasp; any- 
body can understand honey. But the ratio of 
the circumference of a circle to the diameter is 
expressed by, "Pi equals 3.14,168." That is n't 
so easy to grasp ; that 's higher up the scale. 
16 



God 



Can the worm at your feet understand you, 
measure your ways, comprehend your thoughts? 
And yet the distance between that worm and 
you is but a span, compared to the infinite dis- 
tance between you and God. "As the heavens 
are higher than the earth, so are My ways 
higher than your ways, My thoughts than your 
thoughts." I once saw a fly crawling on a 
globe, a globe sixty feet around. How much 
did that fly know of that globe? Yet it crawled 
painfully, slowly on, feeling if haply it might 
find out the what of the globe. When the 
Greeks, and Hindus, and Norsemen, and North 
American Indians, and South Sea Islanders 
called God, "Zeus," "Jupiter," "The Great 
Spirit," "Woden," they were feeling after if 
haply they might find God. Athens, through 
her thirty thousand gods; Brahmanism, through 
her three hundred and thirty million gods; Pa- 
ganism, through her millions and millions of 
gods, were all groping through their darkness 
after God. 

Why was a revelation given to us from God, 
of God? Humanity did n't need a revelation to 
tell it that God is omnipotent. He that hath 
2 17 



^he Gate to the Gospel 



eyes can see that in the flung worlds, the tower- 
ing Mt. Blanc; hear that in the crashing thunder, 
the wave-torn Atlantic, the sweeping cyclone. 
Lo! the poor Indian, even "his untutored mind 
sees God in clouds and hears Him in the wind." 
God's omnipotence is written in letters of fire, 
so that he who runs may read. Man did not 
need a revelation to tell him of God's omnis- 
cience, for everything from dewdrop to sky 
dome, from spider's web to sunbeam, from grass 
blade to great globe, declares the wisdom of 
God. "The heavens declare the wisdom of 
God." 

Man does not need a revelation to tell him 
of God's omnipresence, for "God is here, God 
is there, God is everywhere; go where, you will, 
you meet Him." "If I take the wings of the 
morning and dwell in the uttermost part of the 
earth, if I ascend up into Heaven, if I make my 
bed in hell, behold, God is there." By night 
there whispers a small voice, "Be still and 
know that I am God." 

We do not need a revelation to teach us the 
greatness of God. The Scriptures say that God 
is great, but for always man has felt that there 
* 18 



God 



was something greater than the stars, higher 
than the mountains, deeper than the seas, 
mightier than the universe. The Greeks erected 
an altar to this something and labeled it, "To 
tl|e Unknown God." And the Pagan Athenian 
poet wrote, "In Him we live and move and 
have our being." He who spake and "dust 
stood erect in conscious man," He who "guides 
the planets in their course," "He who hung the 
worlds on nothing, He who hath made us and 
not we ourselves, He is great." 

Nor yet do we need a revelation to tell us 
that God is just, for through every barred gate 
of every prison door we read, "The way of the 
transgressor is hard." "He can not look upon 
sin with any degree of allowance." 

Nations long had their chiseled Joves, repre- 
senting God's might; their Minervas, represent- 
ing God's wisdom; Neptune, the god of the sea; 
Venus, the god of base appetites; Ceres, the god 
of corn; Bacchus, the god of the cup; but no- 
where in high sky or deep sea or broad continent 
or wide wilderness did they ever read, "God is 
love." It took a revelation, a John 3: 16 to tell 
that. "God is love." 

19 



^he Gate to the Gospel 

i 

Has it ever come to your notice that while 
the Bible tells much about God, it never defines 
Him but once. When you read, "God is good, 
just, great, unchangeable, omnipotent," these all 
tell about God ; none of them define Him. These 
are all adjectives. An adjective can not define 
a noun. No adjective is large enough to balance 
a noun. A noun on one side of the equation 
demands a noun on the other. An adjective 
tells something about, but never defines a noun. 
There is only one noun used of God in all the 
Bible. 

Our Scotch fathers gave us the definition of 
God that is in our catechisms, "God is spirit, 
infinite, eternal, unchangeable in His being, 
wisdom, power, holiness, justice, goodness, and 
truth." That definition is good theology, but 
very poor religion. It satisfies the head, but 
has nothing in it for the heart. The one word 
that you would expect to find in this definition 
you do n't find. That definition is good exer- 
cise for the mind, but when one's heart is broken 
and bleeding, he will find that definition a marble 
pillow on which to rest. The disciple "whom 
Jesus loved," who pillowed his head in Jesus' 
20 



God 



heart that last night, gives us the only definition 
of God. Passing strange that our Scotch fathers, 
in seeking a definition, should pass him by who 
said, "God is love.'' The great definition is, 
"God is love." The great fact is the love of 
God. 

When we study the attributes of God that 
we have been naming, after all, they are only 
different ways of spelling love. His omnipo- 
tence is but the arm of His love. His omnis- 
cience is but the medium through which He 
contemplates the object of His love. His wis- 
dom is but the scheme of His love. The offers 
of the gospel are but the invitations of His 
love. The threatenings of law are but warn- 
ings of His love. They are the hoarse voice of 
His love saying, "Man, do thyself no harm." 
They are but a fence of love thrown around the 
pit of destruction to prevent rash man from 
rushing to his ruin. His tears are but the dew- 
drops of His love. His justice is love dealing 
righteously. This earth is but the theater for 
the display of His love. What is Heaven but 
the Alps of His love, from whose summits His 
blessings flow down in a thousand streams to 
21 



^he Gate to the Gospel 



water and refresh the world? No marvel that 
the disciple who felt the beat of that great heart 
shouted, "God is love!" 

If it had not been for God's love, the world 
long since would have been wiped out. Seeing 
the butcheries and blasphemies and holocausts 
and hells and wrongs and wretchedness, if justice 
had spoken, it would have said, "The world 
deserves annihilation; let me annihilate it." 
Truth, seeing the falsehoods and deceptions, 
would have cried, "Away with it!" Omnis- 
cience, if it had spoken, would have said, "I 
have looked into the world's deepest darkness; 
there is not one that doeth good; wipe it out." 
But Love pleads, "Spare it a little time yet; 
wait, wait, I '11 go down." And down, down 
He came, crying, "Let me at this pollution." 
Love pours itself out unto death to wash away 
the world's sin, to cleanse the world's wicked- 
ness, and to make possible the world's recla- 
mation. 

"God is love." The three greatest words 
ever written. Can you grasp them? "God is 
love." When God is pictured as a good Shep- 
herd going out into the darkness and storm and 
22 



God 



tearing hands and feet and heart, up the rough 
mountain height after the lost sheep, it is simply 
a poor way of trying to say, "God is love." 
When we picture the Father weeping over the 
prodigal, and putting around him the best robe, 
and pushing on his finger the golden ring, and 
covering him with His kisses and caresses, it is 
only another way of saying, "God is love." 
When God is represented as the Friend that 
sticketh closer than a brother, when all other 
friends fail us, it's simply, "God is love." 
When we read, "When thy father and mother 
forsake thee, then the Lord will take thee up," 
it is but an attempt to give us a glimpse of the 
immeasurable, "God is love." 

In front of a church in one of our cities there 
is a transparency that flashes out, now in red, 
now in white, now in blue, changing colors every 
fifteen seconds — "God is love." And the records 
of that Church reveal that at least thirty-seven 
men have been led by that ever-changing, ever- 
flaming, "God is love," to know the love of 
God that passeth knowledge. 

Jupiter, the god of the Romans; Zeus, the 
god of the Greeks; Osiris, the god of the Egyp- 
23 



^he Gate to the Gospel 



tians, are remembered only in pictured legend 
and decayed temples. All the gods of the 
heathen are fast passing away. God only is, 
for God is love, and love is eternal. Exclaims 
the psalmist, " Among the gods there is none 
like unto Thee; Thou art God alone." The 
backslidden Baal worshipers of Mt. Carmel 
cried, "The Lord, He is God." The Scripture 
which we read, "Be still and know that I am 
God," is really, "Be still and know God." Do 
you know Him? Have you ever sat down and 
made His personal acquaintance? Do you know 
Him as Father? He is not your father unless 
you are His son, and we become sons only 
through birth. You must be born from above. 
Is He your Friend, your Savior, your Com- 
panion, your Helper? That grand man, Gov- 
ernor Mount, of Indiana, stepped from the ex- 
ecutive chair across the street in Indianapolis 
over into a hotel and fell dead. President Harri- 
son, speaking at his funeral, said, "He took 
God into account in his public and private 
life." Do you? In this Book we read of certain 
ones, "God was not in all their thoughts," and 
the climax of sins is put down as "they that 
24 



God 



forget God." Do you know God? You must 
make His acquaintance here, or you will never 
see His face there, but only hear His voice, 
"Depart from Me; I never knew you." Dr. 
Dale says, "Nobody is afraid of God now." 
Perhaps not now, but then, there, when you 
stand in His mighty presence to give account. 

Pharnaces, while still a rebel, sent a diadem 
to Caesar. Caesar declined it and sent it back 
with, "Your obedience first, then your gifts." 
"To obey is better than sacrifice." Do you 
give God your things but keep back yourself? 
God demands, has a right to demand, your 
heart, your life, your love — you. Do you call 
Him Master, and obey Him not; Lord, and 
serve Him not? Do you know God? 

In the early days of Ohio, while it was still 
an unbroken forest, a young husband and his 
wife went into the dense woods and built them 
a little home. They were alone, save only God 
and the babe — yes, the babe. And the husband 
struggled to make that wilderness blossom as a 
rose. One day, when the babe was two and a 
half years old, hearing its father's ax sounding 
in the far-off wood, it toddled out among the 
25 



^he Gate to the Gospel 



trees to find the father, but alas ! it followed the 
echo rather than the ax, and wandered far, 
and some roving Indians going through, picked 
it up and took it with them to the far North- 
west. That father and mother hunted for days. 
They tried to live in that little cabin, but could 
not stand it. There was the cradle and the 
crude playthings and the sand pile. They left 
it all and went into far Wisconsin. Fourteen 
years with heavy hearts, and then one day there 
came news to them that some Indians at the 
trading post had with them a girl that looked 
not like an Indian girl, and the father went like 
a wild man to see that girl. Their little one had 
a mole upon her right shoulder. This girl had, 
and he told her that she was his girl, and this 
white Indian girl laughed in his face; and then 
he went and got the mother, and she, convinced, 
fell on the ground and hugged the girl's feet. 
And that girl, her girl, spat upon her mother. 
The mother sank to the ground, torn with sor- 
row unto death. At last, semi-beside herself, 
thinking of her babe, she broke out in the cradle 
songs she used to sing over that little thing: 
"Rock-a-bye Baby," "Papa's Pet," "Home, 
26 



God 



Sweet Home." The girl raised her eyes as in a 
dream, looked up, gazed afar, walked as in a 
trance, and threw herself into her mother's 
arms. She had heard the voice of long ago 
calling her. O, the voices of long ago, how they 
call! The voice of thy mother's God, the voice 
of thy father's God. The voice that called thee 
in childhood unheeded, "Son, daughter, give 
Me thy heart." Jesus is tenderly calling to-day, 
calling from afar. Hear His voice. Harden not 
your hearts. Do you know God? Now is your 
day. This is your time to know God. 



27 



"SO LOVED" 



"I can not always trace the way 
Where Thou, Almighty One, dost move, 
But I can always, always say, 
That God is love. 

"When Fear her chilling mantle throws 
O'er earth, my soul to Heaven above, 
As to her native home, upsprings, 
For God is love. 

"When mystery clouds my darkened path, 
I '11 check my dread, my doubt reprove; 
In this my soul sweet comfort hath, 
That God is love. 

"Yes, God is love; — a thought like this 
Can every gloomy thought remove, 
And turn all tears, all woes, to bliss, 
For God is love." 



"SO LOVED" 

1^\R. CHAMBERLAIN, the veteran mission- 
ary of India, one day came into a strange 
heathen village, and the natives made a rush 
for him with their spears to kill him. He raised 
his hand, they paused a moment, and he re- 
peated in their tongue " John 3: 16," and told 
them the story of God's love that sent Jesus 
Christ to them, and then, closing his eyes, he 
sang, "Jesus, Lover of my soul," and when he 
had done every spear was down. He was not 
the first nor yet the last to discover that there 
is all power in these mighty words, "God so 
loved." One day, in the Santa Fe railroad shops 
in Topeka, Kansas, during the noon hour, an 
infidel workman came across a fellow-workman 
reading his Bible, and the infidel said, "What! 
reading that? You don't surely believe it?" 
"Well, I have struck a verse just now I hardly 
know whether to believe or not." "Aha!" re- 
torted the infidel in glee, "I thought so; what is 
it?" "John 3:16 — it seems too good to be- 
lieve." 

31 



^he Gate to the Gospel 



A street waif in New York saw over the 
door of a mission these words, and came in to 
ask what they meant. He was caught by the 
very spell of them. He became a very faithful 
attendant at the mission. They called him 
"John 3: 16." One day he was struck down on 
the streets by a team, badly cut and torn, and 
carried to a hospital. When they inquired his 
name he said, "John 3: 16." One night he was 
very low, and he insisted that the nurse bring 
him a slip of paper, and he printed on it, "John 
3: 16," and asked her to pin it to his pillow for 
him, "For," said he, "I am afraid when God 
comes through He may not be able to find me 
if I do n't have my name pinned on." The 
next morning when the nurse came through he 
was very still and cold, and "John 3: 16" 
fluttered white against his pillow. God had 
found him. He knoweth His own sheep by 
name. 

Notice the great words of this verse. No 
other verse in the world has so many great 
words: "God," "loved," "world," "gave up," 
"Son," "whosoever," "believeth," "perish," 
"everlasting life." "God so loved — loved." The 
32 



So Loved 



longer I live the less I am surprised that Paul 
said, "The greatest of these is love," for that 
word scales the heights, delves the deeps — 
sweetest word of mortal tongue. Love is the 
only thing that lasts. Love is the heart of the 
universe; it 's the soul of God. God would 
cease to live if He ceased to love. Even human 
love is divine. Before one of the large stores a 
woman saw a great sight. There slept, side by 
side in a baby buggy, a little soft-cheeked babe 
five months old, and a little pink-nosed, white- 
as-snow, fluffy puppy. The mother was in the 
store. A little street waif of a girl, barefooted, 
bareheaded, dirty beyond compare, stood now 
caressing the soft cheek of the babe and now 
the snowy face of the little puppy, and the 
woman said, "Are you caring for these?" and 
a great smile broke over the dirty face of the 
little street waif as she said, "No, ma'am, I 'm 
just a-lovin' of them." Even human love is 
divine. One blistering hot Sunday afternoon a 
boy was met two miles out from a Kansas 
town, pushing through the burning sands to- 
ward the country. "Where are you going?" 

asked the man who met him. "I am going out 
3 33 



^he Gate to the Gospel 



there to Sunday school," said the boy, pointing 
to a far-off country schoolhouse. "Are there 
no Sunday schools in town?" asked the man. 
"Yes," said the boy, "but they loves a feller 
out there." Love is the great magnet. Love is 
the divine spark in the human soul. 

It was Raymond Lull who, in 1291, was 
determined to go as a Christian missionary 
among the bloodthirsty Mohammedans of north- 
ern Africa, who said in answer to the pleadings 
of his friends not to go, "He who loves not, 
lives not, and he who lives that life can not 
die." Love is life. Life is love. Men have 
talked much about the love of power. It is 
nothing compared to the power of love. 

Silas Marner was made the victim of the 
blackest ingratitude. His friend was a thief, 
who thrust upon him the blame of a great 
crime. Suddenly this innocent man found all 
houses closed against him, while all markets re- 
fused to buy his wares. Through two long 
years right bravely he looked all men in the 
face. At length he could stand it no longer, for 
hunger and want drove him away from his 
home. Then he shook the dust off his feet 
34 



So Loved 



against his false friends who betrayed him. 
He lost faith in God and man — kindness in him 
soured into envy, sweetness into bitterness. 
Journeying away from home, he went to a dis- 
tant village and there began to work again. 
There he toiled for fifteen years, and at the end 
of that time he had a pile of gold — but he was 
a miser. His gold he hid under the brick floor 
of his house when he was at his work. Each 
night he locked the door, then took his gold and 
poured it on the table and counted it. 

But one evening on returning from his work, 
he lifted the bricks of the floor and, to his 
amazement, the hole was empty. His gold was 
gone. Benumbed and crazed with terror, he 
went everywhere looking for his money, but 
could not find it. Then when it dawned upon 
him that it was really gone, he sent forth a 
wild cry, and in his grief he rushed out of his 
house into the rain and storm of a wild night 
and wandered on and on, stupefied with pain. 
In the early morning he returned to his house. 
On nearing his home he saw through the door 
the glint of something yellow by his hearth. 
With a wild cry he rushed forward and caught 
35 



^he Gate to the Gospel 



it, thinking it was his gold. But it was not 
gold — it was something better. It was the yel- 
low, golden curls of a little child, who had 
strayed into his house. The little wet thing 
stretched her hands toward him and lisped, 
"Papa." Broken-hearted, he took up the de- 
serted child in his arms and pressed her to his 
bosom. As the weeks went on the little child 
took hold of his heart. For the child's sake, he 
turned again to his loom. Love brought back 
again industry and work. For the child's sake, 
he bought carpets for the bare floor, pictures for 
the walls. Love made him tender and un- 
selfish. For the child's sake, he knelt one night 
and recited a child's prayer. Love would fain 
make a Christian of him, but still he hated men. 

Years went on, and the child grew to young 
womanhood. One day a rich man's carriage 
stopped before his cottage door. Then the rich 
man told how this beautiful girl of eighteen was 
his daughter. She wandered away from home 
and they could not find her. Her father had a 
beautiful mansion and great wealth, which she 
would inherit. He told her about it all. But 
she refused to go with him. She turned away 
36 



So Loved 



from it all, and for the love she bore Silas Mar- 
ner, she put her arms about his neck and said, 
"He cared for me and toiled and brought me 
up." Then something gave way and Silas 
Marner wept. His heart was won and made 
over again. Then came confidence in God and 
man. Love destroyed avarice and purged away 
sin and ingratitude, for love is a cleanser, love 
is a transformer. It makes saints out of savages. 
It made a noble man out of Silas Marner, miser 
and atheist. 

O, the transforming power of love! "Jacob 
served seven years for Rachel, and they seemed 
as but one day, for the love he had for her." 
Love's labor is always light. The greatest 
dream in marble is the Taj -Mahal temple of 
India. A young husband-prince began its erec- 
tion as a palace for his beautiful young wife. 
The work was hardly begun when the young 
wife went down into the valley of motherhood, 
and the babe came back alone. The broken- 
hearted young husband cried, "My darling, you 
shall have your palace, though now it be your 
tomb. And so twenty thousand men for twenty 
years labored, and twenty million dollars were 
37 



^he Gate to the Gospel 



expended, and it stood a dream in marble, the 
most wonderful temple of the world. But the 
most wonderful thing is not the temple, but the 
motto over the great doorway, "To the memory 
of an undying love." But even that is not the 
greatest wonder; but when you stand under 
that motto and repeat it out loud, it goes bound- 
ing and bounding up among the great heights 
of the temple, and rebounding back and back 
again, "To the memory of an undying love — 
undying love." What brought Christ down? 
Undying love. What nailed Him to the cross 
and made Him taste death for every man? 
Undying love. 

The disciple that Jesus loved, the disciple 
that loved Jesus, outran all the others to the 
tomb. Love is swift winged. Harriet Beecher 
Stowe's slave who outran the bloodhounds and 
leaped the Ohio was nerved by love. "Love," 
that 's the mightiest word ever lisped. Even 
human love is immeasurable and indescribable. 
Divine love — who can fathom it? "Love di- 
vine, all human love excelling." The prophet 
declares his love held him and would not let 
him go. 

38 



So Loved 



The apostle says, "The love of Christ con- 
straineth me." The word of that apostle, "con- 
straineth," is one of the most varied and rich 
in the Grecian tongue. " Peter's wife's mother 
was taken with a fever." "Taken with" is this 
same word, "constraineth." Love that burns 
one like a great fever. "The multitude did 
throng Him." That word "throng" is this 
same word, "constraineth." Love that presses 
one about like a great multitude. "Lay hold 
on eternal life." "Lay hold on" is that word, 
"constraineth." A love that seizes one and will 
not let him go. "They were driven by a fierce 
wind." "Driven by" is this same word, "con- 
straineth." Love that becomes a mighty motive 
power in one's life. And of the disciples in the 
garden it is said, "They were wrapped in sleep." 
"Wrapped in," is this same word, "con- 
straineth." "The love of Christ constraineth 
me." It swallows one up, hedges one about, 
possesses one, burns within one. Through Jere- 
miah the Lord speaks, "I have loved thee with 
an everlasting love." Solomon says, "He 
brought me into his banqueting house, and His 
banner over me was 'Love.' " 
39 



^he Gate to the Gospel 



I once attended a Conference session of the 
Evangelical Denomination. On Sunday their 
Bishop Bowman preached. His subject was, 
"Heaven." After speaking some forty minutes, 
he flung out the question, "What language will 
we speak in Heaven?" When he had properly 
aroused the interest of the congregation, he 
said, "I know what language we will speak in 
Heaven — the language of Luther — ' Ein feste 
burg ist unser Gott.' " And those hundred and 
fifty broad-shouldered German preachers made 
the church ring with their " Amens." But I went 
out from that service, and, recalling the few 
words of German that I could speak, I felt that 
there was something wrong. No, German won't 
be the language of Heaven. But what language 
will we speak in Heaven? We are told that they 
will come from the four winds of the world, that 
there will be multitudes from every land and 
language. All of the more than four hundred 
tongues of earth will be in Heaven. All are to 
join in the same prayer and praise and worship. 
What will be the language? There is but one 
universal language. 

Stanley tells us that he saw scores of natives 
40 



So Loved 



in Africa whom Livingstone had led to Christ, 
and they could not understand a sentence that 
Livingstone spoke. In what language did he 
preach to them? J. Hudson Taylor says he 
often had missionaries who were the means of 
the conversion of many Chinese, before they had 
mastered the Chinese language. But recently a 
young man in a mission field was carried to his 
burial by nine young men whom he had led to 
Christ before he could utter one whole sentence 
in their native tongue. By what language did 
he reach them? There is but one universal lan- 
guage — the language of love. Is that poetic 
exaggeration? They asked Christ, "What are 
the commandments?" He answered, "Love 
God, love man — love is the commandments." 
Christ pressed — compressed the ten command- 
ments into one word. "Paul, how many great 
things are there?" "Three — faith, hope, love." 
"Are they all equal?" "The greatest of these 
is love." "Peter, what have you to say?" 
"Above all, brethren, have fervent love one for 
another," "And John, you?" " Little children, 
be like God." "What do you mean, John?" 
"God is love." The song of the New Testa- 
41 



^he Gate to the Gospel 



ment from beginning to end is, "Love is the 
fulfilling of the law." Spurgeon shouts, ' 1 Heaven 
is but love spelled out large." 

In Galatians there is a strange and striking 
passage — "The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, 
peace, long-suffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, 
meekness, temperance." A pupil in our public 
schools would not be permitted to say, "The 
fruit is," and then name nine fruits; but, "The 
fruits are." However, this is good grammar, as 
well as good truth. The first one is love, and 
the others are but love spelled differently. Joy 
is love exulting, peace is love in repose, long- 
suffering is love on trial, gentleness is love in 
society, goodness is love in action, faith is iove 
in battle, meekness is love at school, temper- 
ance is love in training. The fruit of the Spirit 
is love spelled nine ways. 

Paul asks, "Who can comprehend the 
length and breadth and depth of the love of 
God?" "Who can know the love of God that 
passeth knowledge?" There is but one answer, 
"No one." Four hundred and two times love 
weeps out, rings out, sings out in the Bible. 
42 



So Loved 



God is exceeding anxious that we get it that 
God loved. Loved? That 's past. It may be 
then His love is a thing of the past, not present. 
Revelation 1:5: "Unto Him who loved us and 
washed us with His blood." But the Revised 
Version is, ' ' Unto him who loveth us and wash- 
eth us." 

Across the seas, in the beautiful churchyard 
of Everleigh, sleeps side by side, awaiting the 
resurrection, Charles Kingsley and his beautiful 
wife. A common tombstone over the two, and 
all there is on that tombstone is their names 
and three words in Latin — "Amavimus, Ama- 
mus, Amabimus" — we loved, we love, we will 
love. There is no tense that can express the 
love of God. It takes in all the present, all the 
past, all the future. "God loved." That is a 
past that is eternally present. 

"God so loved." There is one word in this 
verse that is emphatic — one word in capitals — 
SO. That is the big word of the verse. That is 
the big word of the Book. "Let your light so 
shine;" "If God so clothe the grass of the 
field;" "Do you so even unto others;" "I have 
43 



^Che Gate to the Gospel 



not seen so great faith, no not in Israel;" "As 
the Father sent Me, so send I you;" "We love 
Him because He so loved us." 

I recently had a funeral where the body of 
the dead was kept for ten days before the service. 
The people came from afar. I asked different 
ones where they were from, and their replies 
were, "I am from New York City," "I am from 
Atlanta," "I am from St. Louis," "I am from 
Portland, Oregon," "I am from Mexico City." 
At that funeral I quoted John 3: 16, and then 
asked all to join, and lips that came from the 
four corners of this great continent joined in, 
"God so loved." And you could feel a great 
thrilling throb throughout that great concourse. 
Every man felt it was true that God so loved 
him. So? How much is so? How long is so? 
It 's the little word, the big word of this verse. 
How long is it? It stretches up the Hudson, 
across the Empire State, over the Central Valley, 
up the Rockies, it leaps the western basin, 
climbs the Nevadas, out over the foaming 
Pacific, over the walls of China, across frozen 
Siberia, up the Ural, over the Alps, down the 
Rhine, out over the English Channel, across 
44 



So Loved 



the stormy Atlantic, past the Statue of Liberty 
lighting the world, back to New York. SO. 
Round and round as a ring that has no end, so 
is the love of God for you, my friend. 

We say, "There 's a wideness in God's 
love, like the wideness of the sea." But the 
sea is bounded by shores. God's love is bound- 
less, shoreless. We say, "As the mountains 
round us tower, so the love of God." Aye, but 
the mountains stop. Whether it be Pike's Peak, 
14,000 feet; or St. Elias, 14,000; or Chimborazo, 
21,000; or Everest, 29,000, they all reach their 
limit. There is no limit to the love of God. 
Sometimes we liken the love of God to the river 
that flows on and on, making glad many a 
land; but after flowing on and on perhaps 4,000 
miles, at last the longest river runs out into the 
deep and is done. The love of God never runs 
out, is never done. Paul speaks of the "unfail- 
ing love of Christ." "God so loved." 

How much did Columbus know about Amer- 
ica when he landed on a little island off the 
coast of the West Indies, never having seen a 
mountain or lake or valley or river of the con- 
tinent? How much? Yet he knew much more 
45 



^he Gate to the Gospel 



of America than we can know or comprehend of 
the love of God. "God so loved/ ' How much 
is that? "Greater love hath no man than this, 
that a man die for his friends." God so loved 
that He died for His enemies. Calvary is the 
only measure of the love of God. It reaches 
from everlasting to everlasting. As far as the 
east is from the west, so long is so. We can not 
grasp it, we can not measure it, we can not com- 
prehend it, but surely never again will we care- 
lessly lisp these three words immortal — "God 
so loved." 



46 



"THE WORLD" 



"Sun, moon, and stars convey Thy praise 
Round the whole earth, and never stand; 
So when Thy truth began its race, 

It touched and glanced on every land. 

"Nor shall Thy spreading gospel rest 

Till through the world Thy truth has run; 
Till Christ has all the nations blessed 
That see the light or feel the sun. 

"Great Sun of righteousness, arise, 

Bless the dark world with heavenly light; 
Thy gospel makes the simple wise, 

Thy laws are pure, Thy judgments right." 



"THE WORLD" 

TV /HEN Thomas Paine was about to publish 
his "Age of Reason," Franklin wrote 
him and said, "Don't do it; the Bible is the 
best book the world has ever seen or is likely to 
see." And the best book of the Bible is not 
Matthew, which brings Christ from Abraham 
as the Messiah; nor Mark, which begins at 
Malachi and brings us Christ as the obedient 
servant; nor Luke, which begins with Zacharias, 
and brings us Christ as the Son of Man; but 
John, who goes beyond Zacharias, Malachi, 
Abraham, Adam, beyond the stars, and brings 
Christ out of the bosom of the Father as the 
Lamb of God, come to bear away the sins of 
the world. And the best verse of this best Book 
is John 3: 16. I am not surprised that it is the 
favorite verse of Francis Clark, of the Christian 
Endeavor; the late Mrs. Bottome, of the King's 
Daughters; J. Wilbur Chapman, the world- 
famed evangelist; the late Bishop Ninde; the 

late Ira Sankey, the great singer; and Moody, 
4 49 



^he Gate to the Gospel 



the ever blessed. We study another of the great 
words in this great verse. 

"God so loved the world. 1 ' You can't get 
the measure of the love until you locate its 
object. A woman so loves. What? A baby or 
a poodle? You can't tell the measure of the 
love until you locate the what of the love. 
"God so loved." What? This city, state, 
country, the Anglo-Saxons? Why, there were n't 
any Anglo-Saxons when He hung on the cross. 
Nay, the world; the wicked, wayward, wander- 
ing world. That takes in Asia, with her eight 
hundred and fifty million; Europe, with her 
three hundred and seventy-five million; Africa, 
with her one hundred and seventy million; 
North America, with her one hundred and fifty 
million; Australia, with her four million, — the 
world. That takes in the fifteen hundred million 
of the now, and the two hundred billion that 
have been, and the unnumbered trillions to be 
— the world. 

It is easy to see how God could love some 
people. It is n't hard for me to understand 
how God could love my mother, but me. It is 
easy to conceive that He could love John, but 
50 



Vhe World 



Judas; Elijah, but Jezebel. It surely could not 
have been hard for Him to love Mary, who 
watched at the cross, but the wretches who, 
with hellish delight, drove the great spikes with 
their sledge-hammers into His hands and feet, 
and then with oaths, tore open His heart — how 
He could love them! And yet, while they were 
doing it, He cried, *' Father, forgive them, for 
they know not what they do." Verily, He 
doesn't seem to love people because they are 
good, but to make them good. We love people 
that are lovable, likable; we love saints, God 
loves sinners. Mother, have you ever said to 
your child, "If you are naughty, God won't 
love you?" 

A child on the train was very restless. The 
mother had threatened it again and again. At 
last she shook it and said, "If you do n't behave, 
I will hand you over to the first policeman when 
we get to the station." Of course, the child 
knew the mother was not telling the truth, and 
of course the child only fidgeted the more. 
Another shake, and the mother said threaten- 
ingly, " If you do n't behave, I will open the win- 
dow and throw you out." Of course, the child 
51 



^he Gate to the Gospel 



did not behave. A big commercial traveler 
stepped into the seat past the mother, raised the 
window, and took hold of the child. The mother 
in alarm said, "What are you going to do?" 
"Why," said the commercial traveler, "I am 
going to throw her out for you; she is too big 
for you to throw out." And the things that 
mother said to that traveling man would n't 
sound well to repeat. Mother, have you ever 
said to your child, "If you are naughty, God 
won't love you?" 

I knew a girl that had the most wonderful 
hair of any child I ever saw, and her face and 
eyes matched her hair. Smallpox crept into 
that home one day. The poor little thing lost 
her golden locks and her glorious looks. It was 
weeks before the mother would listen to the 
little one's plea to give her a mirror. And when 
the poor thing saw that her beautiful hair was 
gone and her face was so marked and pocked, 
she wept out, "O mamma! you can't love me 
now." And what did that mother do? You 
know what she did. She just gathered that 
poor little thing in her arms and loved her, 
loved her until it seemed that she could n't love 
52 



"Che World 



her enough. Did that mother love the small- 
pox? Nay, she hated the smallpox, but she 
loved her child even the more, because its 
beauty had been so despoiled by the smallpox. 
God does not love sin. God does not love our 
sins, but He loves us in spite of our sins. He 
died not for saints, but for sinners. Yea verily, 
God does not love us because we are good, but 
to make us good. 

God so loved the world, the wicked world. 
He poured His heart out over the fallen woman 
at the well, and Mary Magdalen with seven 
devils, and the woman taken in the very act of 
adultery, in the eighth chapter of John, and 
Matthew the defrauder, and Zaccheus the op- 
pressor, and the sinning publican, and the dying 
thief. We have a saying, "You can always tell 
a man by the company he keeps." What com- 
pany Christ kept! That is another truth that 
is a falsehood. You can always tell a man by 
the company he makes. Christ took outcast, 
lost, lustful sinners and made them, by His 
companionship, saints of God. Verily, He was 
no respecter of persons. He did n't die for Fifth 
Avenue, New York; nor Euclid Avenue, Cleve- 
53 



^he Gate to the Gospel 



land ; nor Michigan Avenue, Chicago ; nor Wood- 
ward Avenue, Detroit — the world. He would 
have all men to be saved. God so loved the 
world. The six hundred and fifty million yellow, 
six hundred and forty million white, one hundred 
and sixty million black, thirty-five million brown, 
fifteen million red — the world. Pigmy and 
prince, Hottentot and crown head, Eskimo and 
millionaire, savage and civilized — the world. 
All peoples of all colors and all kinds, of all 
climes and all times — the world. The smallest, 
meanest, lowest, littlest, worst, the grandest, 
noblest, highest, purest, best — the world. God 
so loved the world. Do you get it? 

A sheriff in a Texas town was waiting, with 
six handcuffed prisoners, for the train to carry 
them to the State penitentiary. Among the six 
criminals was one so hard-f ced and rough look- 
ing. He was going to serve a twenty-years' sen- 
tence for a great crime. The door of the station 
opened, and a little woman in a faded black 
dress and an old bonnet, and with a face so 
pinched of sorrow, slipped in. She looked 
around intently, and her eyes lit upon the hard- 
faced criminal. She quickly stepped to where 
54 



Vhe World 



he sat. He looked up with an exclamation, 
"Mother, what are you doing here?" "I came 
to see you off, my son." "To see me off?" 
"Yes, Henry, don't you remember when you 
were only six years old and started to school the 
first day, I walked down to the gate and saw 
you off, and all the way to the corner you kept 
turning and waving your hand at me? Then 
when you were twelve, and you went away from 
home for your first visit, I went to the station 
to see you off. Yes, Henry, I have come to see 
you off, and now you are going away again, and 
I must kiss you good-bye, Henry. The train is 
coming, Henry; kiss your old mother good-bye." 
And the hard-faced criminal at last turned his 
face up to the thin old face of the mother and 
she kissed him good-bye. "All aboard!" thun- 
dered the conductor. The little old woman 
waved her little black-bordered handkerchief at 
the window where Henry sat, and muttered, 
"Good-bye, Henry; be a good boy, Henry." 
That is the kind of world, and that is the kind 
of love. 

It remained for the disciples whom Jesus 
loved to bring us, "He loved them to the utter- 
55 



f 

\ ^he Gate to the Gospel 

most." Verily, He is no respecter of persons. 
He proved His love to us, in that while we were 
yet sinners, He died for us. 

The^ converted Irishman said, "He is the 
only One I ever found who would take a man 
without a character." He saves the worst to 
the uttermost. "This is a faithful saying and 
worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came 
into the world to save sinners." "I am come to 
seek and to save the lost^" "They that are 
whole need not a physician, but they that are 
sick." "I am not come to call the righteous, 
but sinners." What good news! All wires flash 
it, all lips herald it, all papers print it. The 
world! "God so loved the world." 



56 



"THAT HE GAVE " 



"Like a cradle rocking, rocking, 

Silent, peaceful, to and fro, 
Like a mother's sweet looks dropping 

On the little face below, — 
Hangs the green earth, swinging, turning, 

Jarless, noiseless, safe, and slow; 
Falls the light of God's face bending 

Down and watching us below. 

"And as feeble babes that suffer, 

Toss and cry, and will not rest, 
Are the ones the tender mother 

Holds the closest, loves the best, — 
So when we are weak and wretched, 

By our sins weighed down, distressed, 
Then it is that God's great patience 

Holds us closest, loves us best. 

"O great heart of God! whose loving 

Can not hindered be nor crossed; 
Will not weary, will not even 

In our death itself be lost, — 
Love divine! of such great loving 

Only mothers know the cost, — 
Cost of love, which, all love passing, 

Gave a Son to save the lost." 



"THAT HE GAVE" 

f^OD so loved the world that He gave." The 
^* Greek has it, "gave up." There's your 
atonement. A man's gifts are the only measure 
of his love. Tell me how much a man gives, 
and I will tell you how much he loves. Then, 
certain millionaires whose names have filled 
large space in popular magazines must be great 
lovers, for they are great givers; do they not 
pour out their money by the millions? Who- 
ever told you that these millionaires whose lists 
of benefactions fill columns have given much? 
All most of them have given never cost them as 
much as six breakfast buns cost many a poor 
man. How many of these millionaires ever did 
without a luxury, to say nothing of a necessity? 
Who gives? The widow who crouched in the 
shadows of the temple until all the millionaires 
had poured in their thousands, and then untied 
her little old handkerchief and let slip in so 
silently her two little mites, and went out from 
that presence to sleep on a bed of straw, for she 
had cast in all her living. 

59 



^he Gate to the Gospel 



Not "How much of my money will I give 
to God?" but "How much of His money will I 
keep for myself?" Not "how much we give," 
but "how much we keep," is God's measure of 
our gifts. Tell me how much a man gives, and 
I will tell you how much he loves. The measure 
of the gift is the measure of the love. I have 
seen folks hand out nickels and dimes to the 
tramp. See you, in the measure of their pennies, 
the measure of their love for the tramp. I know 
some poor folks, so very poor, and yet because 
their little girl wanted a Shetland pony and a 
cart, O how they sacrificed to get it! and they 
counted it all joy to sacrifice for their child. 
It 's just fun to do without things to give to 
those you love. 

"God so loved the world, that He gave" — 
how much? When a man spends thirty dollars 
for his wife's hat and five dollars to send the 
gospel to the world, how much, think you, he 
loves? When a man has a hundred dollars to 
send the gospel to the ends of the earth, and a 
thousand dollars for the State committee of his 
own party, how much do you think he loves the 
world? He that loves not his brother on earth, 
60 



Vhat He Gave 



think you he loves God in Heaven? "Stewards 
of the manifold grace of God," that 's what we 
are. "God so loved the world that He gave up 
His only begotten Son." Gave Him up. O the 
cost of it to God, the tears of it, the tug of it, 
the heart-tearing of it! — God gave Him up — gave 
Him up freely, gladly, willingly. Christ's en- 
emies did n't take His life; He laid it down. His 
was a voluntary sacrifice; He gave up His life. 

The keeper of a drawbridge over a great 
river heard the thunder of the train, and just 
then his little child, playing by his side, rolled 
down the sharp embankment into that mad 
stream. He knew if he but plunged down after 
his child he could not close the drawbridge, and 
the trainload of passengers would plunge to 
their death. He hesitated a moment, and then 
slowly swung the great bridge out to its place, 
and then plunged into the wild waters and pulled 
out his dead child. He could n't save both. 
God could n't save His Son and save the world 
at the same time. 

Away in the Northwest mining camps, Gra- 
ham, the sky-pilot, rescued Nelson, the gambler. 
By and by Nelson took his gold and went to 
61 



^he Gate to the Gospel 



San Francisco. Graham, knowing his past 
weakness, besought him not to go, but Nelson 
was sure he was strong enough to stand. Gra- 
ham followed him. It was only a night or two 
until the gambling sharks had him, and when 
they could not beat him at the game, one of 
them pulled his revolver, when Graham, who 
all the time had been present incognito, flung 
himself between that revolver and Nelson. 
When Nelson bent over the open grave of that 
sky-pilot, he said, "Now I understand for the 
first time the meaning of the Scripture, 'He 
loved me and gave Himself up for me.' " 

So, by such figures we try to get it, to grasp 
what it meant for God to give up His only be- 
gotten Son, but there is no comparison between 
a father giving up his child or a friend dying for 
a friend, and God giving up His Son. We for- 
get that all of us, like sheep, have gone astray, 
and the Lord has piled up on Him the iniquity 
of us all. O, the load of iniquity that was piled 
on Him! Then with the load of our iniquity 
piled on Him, because God could not look upon 
sin with any degree of allowance, He turned His 
back on the cross where His Son was dying. No 
62 



"Uhat He Gave 



wonder it was dark for six hours; for the Light 
of the World had gone out. God turned His 
back on His Son until, in His inexpressible 
agony, that Son cried, "My God, why hast Thou 
forsaken Me?" He expected others to forsake 
Him, but not His Father. It was hard for the 
Son to die. Long before He came to that cross, 
He sweat no longer water, but blood, and that 
was not Calvary; that was only Gethsemane. 
Hard for the Son to die, but harder far for the 
Father to see Him die. 

Mount Everest is five and a half miles 
high. Once there, you are far above pestilence 
and scorching heat and ravenous beasts. Off 
with your hats, for you are in the presence of 
the highest mountain of the world. The highest? 
Mount Everest is not the highest ; the highest is 
Mount Calvary. Mount Everest gives you a 
vision of the Himalayas; Calvary gives you a 
vision of the love of God. Calvary is the highest 
mountain of the world. 

A poor drayman in New York City came 
home one night to find his little girl dying. He 
was a man very wicked, and she made him 
promise that he would not swear nor drink nor 
63 



^he Gate to the Gospel 



beat her mother any more. And the next morn- 
ing, with his little girl dead, he went out and 
painted on his poor dray two words in crude 
letters, "My Darling" — a constant reminder to 
him of his promise. So Calvary, dear Calvary, 
where Jesus died to make me free, is a constant 
reminder of God's love for me. God so loved 
the world that He gave up, gave up, the price- 
less gift of His only begotten Son. Surely, if 
God gave up His Son for us, we will count it all 
joy to give up ourselves to Him. 



64 



"WHOSOEVER" 



"Let every mortal ear attend, 
And every heart rejoice; 
The trumpet of the gospel sounds 
With an inviting voice. 

"Ho! all ye hungry, starving souls, 
That feed upon the wind, 
And vainly strive with earthly toys 
To fill an empty mind. 

"Ho! ye that pant for living streams, 
And pine away and die, 
Here you may quench your raging thirst 
With springs that never dry." 



" WHOSOEVER " 

I ONCE asked Stephen Nkoiyo, a boy born in 
the heart of the Congo, Africa, with a face 
as black as the midnight, what was the thing 
his people liked the best, and he repeated, 
"Nzambi kadi zona kwingi kuzona usi idiau 
kuwanina muana andi wadi mosi kaka vo wonsi 
wuna wo sabuvu kena bungwa ko kasitu wuna 
baka moiyo keumani." I said, "Stephen, that 
does n't mean anything to me; you will have to 
put it in American." And he translated it, 
"God for love so much He loved world that He 
gave Son, His one only, that whosoever Him 
put faith will perish not, but shall have life 
never end." 

The striking thing about those strange words 
is the first word, "Nzambi." That is the word 
in the Congo region for God, and the root of 
that word is "am." The word for God among 
the Crete Indians is "Maneto," and the root 
is "ma," which is our "am." One of the most 
remarkable things in the world is that the 
67 



^he Gate to the Gospel 



word for God in the darkest lands among the 
lowest peoples is "am." God never gave Him- 
self a name but once. When God commanded 
Moses to go to Pharaoh and tell him to let the 
people go, Moses said, "And when Pharaoh asks 
me who sent me, who am I to say sent me?" 
And God said, "Tell him I AM sent you." 
How did these nations of the earth get the name 
of God that He gave Himself? This argues for 
a common origin of the human race. 

These same peoples of the Congo practice 
the rite of circumcision. When you ask them 
why, they tell you that their fathers practiced 
it before them. The same is found to be true 
among all the tribes of Africa. All this argues 
a common origin of the races. Then, too, you 
find among these peoples and all peoples of 
every continent and island the story of the 
flood, the story of creation, the belief of immor- 
tality, Heaven, hell. When you find a thing 
that all peoples believe, you may be sure you 
have found a thing that is true. Universal be- 
lief is true belief. 

But of all things that you find among all 
nations, nothing is so striking as the name for 
68 



Whosoever 

God— "AM." "I AM," God said to Moses-, 
"this is My name through all generations." 
The largeness of these two words. It is as 
though God handed humanity a blank check, 
saying, "Fill it out." "Art thou in darkness?" 
"I am thy light." "The light that lighteth 
every man that cometh into the world, the light 
of the world." "The Lord is my light and my 
salvation." "Art thou orphaned?" "I am thy 
Father," who forgets not how, as an innocent 
child, the boy once played at the Father's knee, 
and that Father now sits on the housetop, 
bowed and broken, looking, longing, wondering, 
waiting for the return of the ragged prodigal, 
waiting ready to leap and lavish upon him love 
untold and untellable. He would lead us to 
say, "Our Father." "Hast thou wandered 
astray?" "I am the Good Shepherd." But, 
finding the disobedient, runaway sheep, He does 
not beat it as it deserves and as we do, does not 
even drive it home, but seeing its stone-bruised, 
bleeding feet, wraps it in His great cloak against 
the biting night storm and bears it tenderly 
home. He would lead us to say, "The Lord is 
my Shepherd." "Art thou comfortless?" "I 
69 



^he Gate to the Gospel 



am thy comfort." "Like as one whom his 
mother comforteth, so will I comfort you." 
"A mother may forget her nursing child, yet 
will I never forget thee." 

"Think not thou canst sigh a sigh 
And thy Maker is not by; 
Think not thou canst weep a tear 
And thy Maker is not here." 

He is here — God, thy Maker. " Art thou friend- 
less?" "I am the Friend that sticketh, sticketh,. 
sticketh closer than a brother." A Friend in- 
deed, a Friend in need. 

"Far out on the desolate billow 

The sailor sails the sea, 
Alone with the night and the tempest, 

Where countless dangers be; 
Yet, never alone is the Christian 

Who lives by faith and prayer, 
For God is a Friend unfailing, 

And God is everywhere." 

"Art thou hungry?" "I am the Bread of life; 
eat and live." "Is thy throat scorched with 
thirst?" "I am the Living Water; drink and be 
satisfied." "Art thou weary? I am the Shiloh, 
the Rest-giver." "I am thy all in all." Yes, 
70 



Whosoever 



Nzambi — God so loved, is the best thing that 
ever went to the Congo, and the best word the 
world ever heard. 

The Sunday before Benjamin Harrison left 
Indianapolis to become President of the United 
States, he presented each member of his great 
Sunday school class with a morocco-bound copy 
of the Gospel of John, with John 3: 16 under- 
lined in red, and in the fly-leaf written, "The 
best message this world ever had from its best 
Friend." On that famous five o'clock in the 
morning, when Joshua Speed came upon Abra- 
ham Lincoln reading his Bible in the White 
House, he discovered, when he bent over Lin- 
coln's shoulder, that he was reading the third 
chapter of John, and had his finger hard upon 
this verse. 

Francis Junius, the great scholar, when 
young, drifted into skepticism, and one day his 
father put on his dresser this book open at this 
verse, this verse underlined. In a flash young 
Francis saw it all — himself, his sins, his future, 
God, love, the cross. Great sweat broke from 
his brow, and shuddering, he fell sobbing to his 
71 



^he Gate to the Gospel 



knees, and there the miracle of the ages hap- 
pened, the lost skeptic found the living Lord. 
"God so loved the world.' ' 

"God." 0, the height and length and 
breadth and depth and measureless, fathomless, 
endlessness of that word, God! 

"So loved." "All things on earth shall 
wholly pass away except the love of God; it 
shall live and last for aye." 

"For the love of God is broader 

Then the measure of man's mind, 
And the heart of the Eternal 
Is most wondrously kind." 

"Love divine, all love excelling." 

"The world." He proved His love for us 
by loving us when we were loveless. Verily, 
He is no respecter of persons. Having loved, 
He loved to the uttermost. No wonder He 
draws all men. The world, with its teeming 
millions, its weak millions, its wicked millions. 

"That He gave up His only Son." O, the 
priceless cost of us! We are not bought with 
silver and gold and such cheap things, but with 
the precious blood of Christ* He loved us and 
bought us with His blood. 

72 



Whosoever 



"Whosoever." A Dutch farmer in South 
Africa, seeing a Hottentot reading his Bible, 
said, as he kicked him, "That Book isn't for 
such as you." "Indeed it is." "How do you 
know?" "Why, my name is in it." "Your 
name, where?" "Why, right here." And he 
laboriously spelled out John 3:16 until he 
came to "who-so-ever," and slowly spelling it 
out, he said, "There it is." 

The most tragic hour of my life, I believe, 
was one Sunday morning in the State peniten- 
tiary of a Western State. I was there because I 
knew a pardon would be read that morning for 
one of the men, Henry Curtis. Henry Curtis, 
under greatest provocation and beside himself 
in a fit of temper, had killed a man, but he was 
not a murderer at heart. He was sentenced to 
life imprisonment. He had already served 
seventeen years. Some years after his imprison- 
ment he was converted, and when we organized 
a Y. M. C. A. in that penitentiary he was 
elected president. One year we held the State 
Convention of that State in that city. He 
wrote a letter to the convention, in which he 
said, "We are with you in spirit; circumstances 
73 



^he Gate to the Gospel 



over which we have no control make it impossible 
for us to be with you in body." That letter in- 
dicated that he had a head as well as a heart. 

The Y. M. C. A. fellows became interested 
in him, and when a good Christian was elected 
governor, we worked for his pardon. On this 
Sabbath morning I sat on the platform with 
the warden and the chaplain. The warden 
stood and said, "Before the service concludes, 
I will read a pardon from the governor for one 
of the prisoners." 

The chaplain then preached a never-to-be- 
forgotten sermon on "The great pardon." 
At its close, the warden stood and held the 
pardon in his hand. You could literally hear 
the hearts of those eight hundred and ninety 
men beat. Then he read the name, "Henry 
Curtis," and said, "Henry Curtis may step to 
the platform." There was not a move. Again 
he repeated the name, and then the chaplain 
stepped down and touched him on the shoulder 
and said, "Henry, have you forgotten your 
name?" And, looking like one dazed, he said, 
as he touched himself, "Me?" "Why, yes; 
did n't you hear your name?" "Why, I did n't 
74 



Whosoever 



think such news could be for me. I thought 
there must be another Henry Curtis." I am so 
glad the Lord didn't put in "God so loved 
Elmer Ellsworth Helms," for there is another 
Elmer Ellsworth Helms in a little hamlet in 
Indiana; perhaps He would have meant -that 
one and not this one. But, " Who-so-ever " — 
that sweeps us all in — good and bad, rich and 
poor, black and white — who-so-ever. That 's 
my name. I am a universalist ; I believe who- 
soever will may come. God is a universalist; 
He would have all men to be saved and come 
to a knowledge of the truth. But ye will not 
come that ye might have life. The trouble is 
not with God, but with us. 



75 



"BELIEVETH" 



"There is no unbelief; 
Whoever plants a leaf beneath the sod, 
And waits to see it push away the clod, 
He trusts in God. 

"Whoever says, when clouds are in the sky, 
'Be patient, heart, light breaketh by and by,' 
Trusts the Most High. 

"Whoever sees, 'neath Winter's field of snow, 
The silent harvest of the future grow, 
God's power must know. 

"Whoever lies down on his couch to sleep, 
Content to lock each sense in slumber deep, 
Knows God will keep. 

"Whoever says, 'To-morrow,' 'The unknown,' 
'The future,' trusts unto that power alone 
He dares disown. 

"The heart that looks on when the eyelids close, 
And dares to live when life has only woes, 
God's comfort knows. 

"There is no unbelief; 
And day by day and night unconsciously, 
The heart lives by that faith the lips deny 
God knoweth why." 



"BELIEVETH" 

OREAD can not keep a man from starving 
unless he eat it. Water can not keep a 
man from famishing unless he drink it. Clothes 
can not keep a man from freezing unless he 
wrap himself in them. Believing is reaching out 
and taking the bread of life, eating and living. 
Believing is taking the cup and drinking the 
water of life and being satisfied. Believing is 
wrapping one's self in the robe of righteousness 
against the chilly frost of sin. It matters not 
what God is, and what He has done and what 
He has given for man, if there is no way for 
man to get to God or God to get to man, of 
what avail is it? 

Surely, if God has done so much lor man, 
given so much to man, then He has provided a 
way for man to lay hold of God's great gift. 
Believing is that way. But mere believing is 
not enough. "The devils believe," but they 
are not saved. To believe and fear is not enough. 
"The devils believe and tremble." "With the 
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^he Gate to the Gospel 



heart, man believeth unto righteousness." Be- 
lieving with the head is not enough. To give 
assent, consent, to nod, to approve, is one 
thing; to lay hold on, seize, appropriate, make 
one's own, is quite another thing. A man may 
know his Bible so well he can stick a pin through 
the leaves and can tell what word on each page 
the pin pierces, and he may mentally consent 
to it all, and yet not know God. To believe is 
not to accede, approve. That 's a mere intel- 
lectual performance. To believe is to nestle 
the soul in God, to embosom one's self in God. 
To consent to God with the head, and to lay 
hold of Him with the heart, are vastly different 
things. 

A little fellow had a splendid father; one of 
those men that believed everything with his 
head and nothing with his heart. One day the 
little fellow said, "Mother, is papa a Christian?" 
"Why do you ask, my son?" "Why, I never 
hear papa pray." And the mother said, "Willie, 
suppose you ask him to-night." As usual, the 
father went up to kiss Willie good-night when 
he came home, Willie being in bed. "Papa, I 
want you to do something for me; will you do 
80 



Believeth 



it?" "Why, of course I '11 do it, my dear." 
"Well, papa, I want you to get down and pray." 
"Why, my son, I could n't do that." "But you 
promised me." "But I don't know how." 
"Well, you get down, papa, and I will teach 
you." He couldn't help himself. On his 
knees, with the little fellow's hand upon the 
father's head, the little fellow said, "Create in 
me a clean heart, O God!" And that father 
sobbed until he shook the bed as he cried, 
"Create in me a clean heart, O God, for Jesus' 
sake! Lord, I believe, help!" And for the first 
time that father believed. You who have been 
assenting, consenting, acceding, approving — 
that 's not believing. 

God is so anxious that we understand what 
believing is, that He puts the same thing in 
different words again and again, that we may 
grasp it. John 1:12, "As many as received 
Him, to them gave He power to become the 
sons of God." Receiving is believing. Rev. 
3: 20, "Behold, I stand at the door and knock; 
if any man will open the door, I will come in." 
Opening the door, admitting Him, is believing. 
Heb. 7:25, "Wherefore, He is abfe to save all 
6 81 



^he Gate to the Gospel 



them to the uttermost who come unto God by 
Him." Coming is believing. Isa. 55:6, "Seek 
the Lord while He may be found." Seeking is 
believing. Rom. 10: 13, "Whosoever shall call 
upon the name of the Lord shall be saved." 
Calling is believing. 

Just at the close of the Civil War, a number 
of Southern soldiers somehow got separated 
from the army and got too far North. For days 
they wandered about, hiding in the woods, fear- 
ing every hour that some Northern soldiers 
would see them and make them prisoners. 
They were almost starving when a Southern 
officer chanced to come upon them. "What 
are you doing here?" he asked. They told him 
they had gotten lost, and were afraid of their 
lives. "Why! the war is over; you can go to 
the nearest town, whether it is North or South, 
it does not matter, for peace has been pro- 
claimed." Peace had been purchased, peace had 
been provided for them, but they had not re- 
ceived, believed. Whosoever believeth is at 
peace. "Therefore, being justified by faith, we 
have peace with God." 

A Brooklyn newsboy was caught and crushed 
82 



Believeth 



under a great wagon. He was all bruised and 
torn. They picked him up and hurried him to 
a hospital. In the hospital they hurried him to 
the operating table. Quickly they were ready 
to operate, hoping to save his life. The little 
fellow raised his little hand and said, "Doctor, 
am I going to die?" The doctor said, "You 're 
badly hurt, my boy, you are badly hurt." " But 
Doctor, do you think I am going to die?" 
"Why, I hope not, my boy, but you are badly 
hurt." "Doctor, wait a minute. I have never 
made a public profession; I want to do it now." 
Then he turned his eyes upon the white-angeled 
nurse and said, "Will you hold my hand?" All 
heads were bowed. Gripping the nurse's hand 
and closing his eyes, the little fellow murmured, 

"I - believe - in - Jesus - Christ - my - Sav " 

and his lips were sealed still. He was in the arms 
of the Great Physician. That is believing. 
Believing, bridges the chasm between man and 
God, earth and Heaven, the sinner and the 
Savior. Believing is the ladder over which we 
climb out of guilt into grace, up to glory. Be- 
lieving wings one to God. 



83 



"IN HIM" 



"Thou art the Way: — to Thee alone 
From sin and death we flee; 
And he who would the Father seek, 
Must seek Him, Lord, by Thee. 

"Thou art the Truth: — Thy Word alone 
True wisdom can impart; 
Thou only canst inform the mind, 
And purify the heart. 

"Thou art the Life: — the rending tomb 
Proclaims Thy conquering arm; 
And those who put their trust in Thee 
Nor death nor hell shall harm. 

"Thou art the Way, the Truth, the Life; 
Grant us that Way to know, 
That Truth to keep, that Life to win, 
Whose joys eternal flow." 



"IN HIM" 



OT in a creed, not in the Church, not in the 



A ~ preacher, not in here, in Him; not in my 
goodness, but in His grace. Salvation is not 
found here, but there. "There is none that 
doeth good." "The heart is deceitful above all 
things." "Can the leopard change his spots?" 
There is no working out of one's own salvation. 
"In Him." That's Paul's, "I know whom I 
have believed," or, as the Greek puts it, "I 
know Him." Do you know Him? Do you 
know Him as your Savior? Francis Ridley 
Havergal, the writer of so many sweet hymns, 
dying, cried, "My King, my King!" Is He 
yours? Do you know Him? You know lots of 
things, lots of people, but do you know Him? 
"Whosoever believeth in Him." "There is only 
one name under Heaven, given among men, 
whereby we may be saved." A missionary in 
India and a fellow laborer sat one evening in 
their tent disheartened. All the week they had 
labored to no purpose. Even that very morn- 




87 



^he Gate to the Gospel 



ing they had gone at four o'clock to preach in 
the villages. Returning, they could but say, 
"Lord, who hath believed our report?" Weary 
and discouraged, as they sat in their tent they 
chanced to look out through the meshes. A 
few rods away they saw a striking sight. An 
old gray-haired Brahman had erected a small 
shrine against the trunk of a banyan tree, and 
was lost in his devotions. With beads in hand, 
round and round he performed his circumambu- 
lations, keeping his face ever toward the shrine, 
and reciting over and over his prayers. Each 
time he came in front of the shrine he prostrated 
himself upon the ground. Then up and around 
again. At last he sank exhausted. 

Greatly impressed with the old Brahman's 
earnestness, the two missionaries went out and 
asked him what he sought by these genuflec- 
tions, circumambulations, and prayers. 

"O sirs," said he, in a voice that came from 
his soul, "I am seeking to get rid of the burden 
of sin. All my life I have been seeking it, but 
each effort I make is as unsuccessful as the one 
before, and still the burden is here. My pil- 
grimages, prayers, and penances for sixty years 
88 



In Him 



have all been in vain. Alas! I know not how my 
desire can be accomplished." 

Then, in answer to their inquiry, he gave 
them the story of his life. In early life he had 
been sorely troubled by the thought of his un- 
expiated sins. His parents died when he was 
seventeen, leaving him, as the sole heir, great 
wealth. He consulted the priests, and they told 
him if he would give all his wealth to build a 
temple, his burden would go. "I gave the load 
of my money, but the load of my sin became 
no lighter." 

Then they told him to go to Benares, the 
holy city. Two thousand miles on foot he went, 
and spent two years in its temples. But all 
this time the burden grew. Then, advised by 
the priests, he spent two years bathing in the 
holy Ganges. "Ganges," said he, "washed the 
foulness of my skin, but did not change the 
foulness of my soul." 

Then again, afoot, nearly three thousand 
miles, to another holy city, and another. Being 
without money, he lived on roots and nuts, 
slept out in the drenching rain, fell many a 
time, fainting and near dead, under the scorch- 
89 



^he Gate to the Gospel 



ing sun. For years he trudged through the 
tropical jungles in a vain search for relief from 
the burden of sin. 

"And now, sirs," said he, "my life is almost 
gone; my hair is thin and white; my eyes are 
dim; my teeth are gone; my cheeks are sunken; 
my body is wasted; I am an old, old man; and 
yet, sirs, the burden of my sin is heavier than 
when I was a young man. sirs, does your 
Veda tell how I can get rid of this burden of 
sin and be at peace? Our Vedas have not 
shown me." 

Looking into that hungry old face, how 
gladly the missionaries told him of Him who 
said, "Come unto Me, all ye that are heavy 
laden, and I will give you rest." How eagerly 
he listened! "Would you like to have Him?" 
asked the missionary. "O yes, sir, if He could 

take away this awful " "And just then," 

according to the testimony of the old Brahman, 
"the load was all gone, and it was so peace in 
here," pointing to his breast. And his face 
shone like the face of an angel. Verily, "There 
is none other name under Heaven, given among 
men, whereby ye can be saved," but that name. 
90 



In Him 



There is only one way. He said, "I am the 
Way." There is only one door. He said, "I 
am the Door." 

He has the key to the city. How are you 
going to get in without the key? And how are 
you going to get the key without a personal ac- 
quaintance with Him. "Blessed are they who 
have washed their robes and made them white 
that they may have a right to the key and may 
enter in through the door into the city." Have 
you the key? It's in the Christ hand. "In 
Him." I know nothing that more needs em- 
phasis than "in Him," in these days of formalism, 
externalism, make-believe moralism. " In Him." 
It 's Christ or nothing. 

The old captain of the Merrimac was an 
inmate of the Pennsylvania Soldiers' Home. 
He was a skeptic. For long the chaplain tried 
to get him to read the Bible, but he would not. 
At last he said to the captain, "Read it, and 
mark in red anything that you do n't believe. 
Begin with the Gospel of John." The captain, 
with a glitter in his eye, took up the challenge. 
He was sick at the time, confined to bed. Every 
few hours the chaplain, passing his door, would 
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^he Gate to the Gospel 



call in and say, "Captain, have you marked 
anything yet?" The old captain would grin, 
but say nothing. After a day or two, when the 
chaplain stepped in, there lay the old captain 
dead, with his Bible open. The chaplain leafed 
through the Gospel of John. Nothing marked 
in all the first chapter, nor all the second chapter, 
nor all the third, until he came to John 3: 16, 
and in red was written, "I have cast my anchor 
in a safe harbor, thank God!" He 'd found the 
only anchor that could grip and the only rock 
that could hold. It was John 3:16. Father 
Taylor, of Boston, used to cry, "My anchor 
holds." There is only one anchor that will 
hold. There is only one anchor that can hold, 
" belie veth." There is only one place that will 
hold, "in Him." 

John B. Gough tells us that one Sunday he 
slipped into a church, and into a pew. He was 
not conscious that any other one was in the pew 
until some one asked what hymn it was they 
had announced. Gough turned to look into the 
most repulsive face he ever saw. The man was 
not only blind, but his eyes were awful to be- 
hold. And he was suffering from some nervous 
92 



In Him 



disease that made his face twitch most terribly. 
Gough says when they began to sing, the harsh, 
discordant, gutteral notes of the man beside 
him almost drove him mad. But when they 
came to the verse: 

"Just as I am, poor, wretched, blind, 

O lamb of God, I come, I come." 

Mr. Gough turned, and the poor man had 
lifted his sightless eyes to Heaven and, with 
the hot tears burning down his poor, twitching 
cheeks, he cried it out of his very soul. Mr. 
Gough declared, "I have heard the finest strains 
of orchestra, choir, and soloist that the world 
has ever produced, but I never heard music 
until I heard that blind man sing out, sob out, 
"O, Lamb of God, I come, I come!" 

So we, blind and destitute and ruined and 
disfigured and unsightly and repulsive of sin, all 
we can do is to cry, just cry, only cry, 1 1 Just as 
I am, I come" — and come. He waits for you, 
He wants you, He will welcome you. "Jesus 
Christ came into the world to save sinners." 
That is your name. Come, step on His torn 
hand; He will lift you safely over the chasm. 
Look and live. 93 



"PERISH" 



"Come, wandering sheep, O come! 
I '11 bind thee to My breast, 
I '11 bear thee to thy home, 
And lay thee down to rest. 

"I saw thee stray forlorn, 

And heard thee faintly cry, 

And on the tree of scorn, 
For thee I deigned to die. 
What greater proof could I 

Give than to seek the tomb? 

Come, wandering sheep, O cornel' 



"PERISH" 

JOHN EVERETT CLOUGH recently died in 
Rochester, N. Y., at the home of his brother- 
in-law, Professor Rauschenbush, of the Rochester 
University. Many years ago the Baptists were 
about to give up their work in Telugu, India, 
when there appeared in their missionary office 
in Boston, a lean, long, lank young fellow from 
the prairies of Iowa, and asked the privilege of 
going. He looked anything but promising, but 
since they were going to give it up anyhow, and 
he was willing to go without salary or guarantee, 
they let him go. When he stepped off the boat 
at Bombay, there were thrown off some survey- 
ing instruments, sent out by the English Govern- 
ment to be used in running a canal through the 
Telugu country. There was to have been on 
that same steamer an English surveyor, but he 
missed his boat. Five thousand men were ready 
to work, the instruments were at hand, but no 
surveyor. 

"God moves in a mysterious way, His won- 
7 97 



^he Gate to the Gospel 



ders to perform. " Young Clough was a civil 
engineer. He offered his services to the govern- 
ment, without money and without price. Around 
the camp-fire at night, through a native inter- 
preter, he learned to say John 3:16, and he 
repeated it over and over to that great company 
of natives. By and by he learned a few sen- 
tences in their tongue about each of the great 
words of this verse, and that first year he bap- 
tized five thousand and sixty-one; in two years, 
over eleven thousand; in a single day, two 
thousand; and with his own hand he baptized 
more than sixty thousand. He has left two 
sons behind him, now that he is gone, to carry 
on his great work. For thirty-four years his 
text was John 3: 16. 

Reverently, God did His best in this verse. 
No wonder Luther said, "It's the gospel in a 
nutshell." It 's the Bible in twenty-five words. 
It spells: 

God so loved the world, that He gave His 
Only begotten 

Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not 

Perish, but have 

Everlasting 

Life. 

98 



Perish 



This verse has in it four great things: A great 
personality — God ; a great fact — loved the world ; 
a great result — that He gave His only begotten 
Son; a great purpose — that men might be saved. 

"Should not perish." Perish — then it 's pos- 
sible to perish. "The Son of Man is come to 
seek and to save the lost." Then, there are lost 
men. "I am come that you might have life." 
Then, there are men dead in trespasses and in 
sins. "They that are whole need not a physi- 
cian, but they that are sick." Then, there are 
men sick and in need of healing. "I am the 
Light of the world." Then, there are men who 
are in gross darkness. "Perish." Is that a 
little word? A light word? Did God just put 
that in to fill up? Does that read like, "If you 
do n't repent a little and be converted in a 
measure, you will be damned somewhat? "Per- 
ish" — that's deep as eternity, with solemn 
awfulness. "Whosoever believeth in Me shall be 
saved, but whosoever believeth not, shall perish." 

" Perish " — that 's a continuous future; that 's 
for ever and ever perishing, but never perished. 
Do you see any glimmer of hope in that word, 
any ray of light? Think you that it is a little 
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^he Gate to the Gospel 



thing to turn one's back on God, a trifle to 
tread under foot the blood of the covenant, of 
no importance that, Cain-like, Adam-like, prod- 
igal-like, you go your own way ? 1 ' Perish ' ' — it 's 
an awful thing to perish. And it is so easy. 
True, God is not less interested, less persistent 
than the devil. True, God holds on to a man to 
the very end, and if he perish, it is against the 
utmost God can do. But while "Narrow is the 
way that leads to life, broad is the way that 
leads to death, and many go in thereat." The 
way to death is broad, and many find it. The 
way to life is narrow, and few find it. Millions 
of apple blossoms to thousands of apples. What 
becomes of the millions of blossoms? They 
perish. Thousands of spawn to hundreds of 
fish. What becomes of the many spawn? They 
perish. Many eggs, few fowl. It is easy to 
perish. 

Rebecca Goldberg, aged four, and Tessie 
Satriani, aged ten, whose parents are next-door 
neighbors at Corona, Long Island, were picking 
grapes in the Goldberg yard one afternoon, while 
Mrs. Goldberg watched them from her window. 
After stepping into the kitchen for a few min- 
100 



Perish 



utes, the mother returned to the window, but 
saw no children. She went out to find them, 
and, to her horror, she saw that the weight of 
the children upon the lid of an old well had 
broken it, and that the children had fallen 
through it into the water. The cistern, which 
was twenty feet deep, had four feet of water 
in it. The mother, in looking down, saw the 
clothing of her child and knew that the children 
had fallen through. The neighbors secured long- 
handled rakes and drew out the lifeless bodies 
of the children. Every effort was made by the 
physician to resuscitate them, but all in vain. 
Some of the most beautiful and luscious grapes 
in the arbor grew just over the top of the well, 
and the little ones, in undertaking to reach them, 
fell into the water. While reaching for grapes 
they perished. Yea, it is easy to perish and 
awful 

Some years ago, our representative at Can- 
ton, China, after having served a good many 
faithful years, started to return to this country 
with his wife and three children. It is well 
remembered to this day how that great ship 
went down right at the Golden Gate at San 
101 



r 

^he Gate to the Gospel 



Francisco, and he and his wife and children all 
perished. When the news reached his old 
mother, who had lived in anticipation of seeing 
her long-absent son and family in a few days, 
she cried out, "It is like perishing on one's own 
doorstep." Yea, it is an awful thing to perish. 
But it is a thousand times more awful to perish 
in sight of the cross — yes, in spite of the cross. 
You 've seen copies of Schenck's famous paint- 
ing, "Lost" — a flock of sheep caught by a 
blizzard. The fierce cold had twisted their wool 
into icicles, their blood is congealing, they are 
blinded by the fury of the storm, humped to- 
gether, with the black, bitter blizzard biting 
them to the bone. Yonder a great opening in 
the rock, cross-shaped. In that open heart of 
the rock is shelter, but the sheep are not looking 
that way; their backs are to it; they aren't 
headed that way. It 's an awful thing to perish. 
It 's a thousand times more awful to perish in 
sight of the cross, in spite of the cross. 

The mother of a wayward boy sickened and 
suddenly died. Night after night that boy had 
broken his father's and mother's heart by going 
in the broad way of death. The father thought 
102 



Perish 



that surely his boy would stay in with him the 
night after the funeral, but as soon as the supper 
was over the boy prepared to go out. The 
father begged of him to stay in with him that 
one night. The boy pushed toward the door. 
The father laid himself down across the threshold 
and said, "My son, if you will go out to-night, 
you will have to go over my prostrate body." 
And that wicked, wayward boy deliberately 
stepped over the body of his father and went 
out into darkness, to death. Yes, men can 
perish, but they must do it over the prostrate, 
pierced body of the Lord Christ. 

If men refuse bread, they will starve; if men 
refuse water, they will famish; if they refuse 
clothes, they will freeze. "How can we escape 
if we refuse so great salvation?" How? That 
is a question that has never been answered; 
there is no answer. 

In an Alpine village, some American tourists 
found the villagers in sorrow. A Harvard stu- 
dent lay crushed. He had crossed the seas and 
come to climb the Alps. Up the dizzy heights, 
he stood upon a slender peak. On the way back 
he said to the guide, "I am tired of these ropes 
103 



^he Gate to the Gospel 



tied to me; I can take care of myself." The 
guide protested, and besought him and warned 
him, but he flung off the ropes and said, "I am 
able to take care of myself." In a few minutes 
he stepped on what looked to be snow, but 
proved to be slippery ice, and in a moment, 
hundreds of feet below, he was a crushed, dead 
mass. Men who will follow their own way, who 
will follow the devices of their own hearts, who 
refuse to be bound to God, who have a will of 
their own, a way of their own, will perish, in 
sight of the cross, in spite of the cross. "Not 
perish." Thank God for the "not." "Whoso- 
ever believeth in Him shall not perish." 



104 



"EVERLASTING LIFE" 



"Jesus, wilt Thou go before 
On life's pathway evermore? 
We will not delay, the while, 
After Thee in faith to toil. 
Lead us by Thy gentle hand 
To our blessed Fatherland. 

"If the way be rough and drear, 
Firmly let us persevere, 
And in darkest days refrain 
At their burdens to complain; 
For through sorrows here must lie 
Ways that lead to life on high!" 

/ 



"EVERLASTING LIFE" 



IFE. Life fills a large place in the world, 



*~ 1 the Bible, and science, and it 's the all of 
Heaven. Life — what is life? We know little of 
it. We know some of its manifestations. It 
means the eye to flash, the pulse to throb, the 
blood to beat hot, the cheek to flush with health, 
the face to glow. Life means much to us, every- 
thing to us, but who knows what it is? Who 
can define it? Who can even define physical life? 

Herbert Spencer gave us the definition of 
physical life that was standard for thirty years, 
and then after thirty years, he went back on his 
own definition. If physical life is beyond defini- 
tion, what of spiritual life? And, if not spiritual, 
what of eternal life? 

Is eternal life, everlasting life, a matter of 
the almanac? Is life that lasts ever and ever- 
lasting life one and the same? Eternal life. 
And what is this eternal life? When one man 
has it, and another man has it not, do they just 
belong to different standards, but in the same 




107 



^he Gate to the Gospel 

school? Is human life all of a piece, of the same 
fundamental essence, and varying only in quality 
and degree? Is eternal life only common life 
refined, or is it a new creation? Is eternal life 
just life in the higher grades, and can we be 
schooled and cultured into it? That is certainly 
the basis and trend of many men's reasoning. 
Life to them, in all its human range, would be 
imaged in a column of Aberdeen granite which 
stands in the museum of the University of 
Edinburgh. The column is of one unbroken 
piece, but it is arranged in ascending sections to 
represent the different processes and stages 
through which the granite passes from the 
quarry to the polished shaft. The pedestal is 
rough, jagged, and primitive, just as it left the 
quarry, bearing all the marks of the blasting. 
And then follow layer upon layer, each succeed- 
ing one being subjected to a more rigid dis- 
cipline than its predecessor, until every un- 
couthness is left behind, and all its wealthy and 
exquisite veins are discovered in the refined and 
shining product. And that, I say, is how many 
people reason about eternal life. Eternal life is 
just common life perfected. Common life is the 
108 



Everlasting Life 



rough-hewn block; eternal life is the same block 
chastened and refined. The two do not repre- 
sent a change of substance; they represent dif- 
ferences effected by labor and culture. And so 
eternal life is just an accomplishment; it belongs 
to a different standard, but not to a different 
order." And is that eternal life, and is that the 
difference between life and eternal life? What 
is eternal life? Who can define it? Who can 
define love, thought, genius? There are lots of 
things we possess that we can not define. 

John says more about eternal life than all 
the others, but he never attempts to define it. 
He describes it, suggests its nature and source, 
and tells us many things about it, but he never 
defines it. The word translated, "eternal life," 
occurs one hundred and twenty-five times in 
the New Testament, but nowhere is there any 
attempt at definition. "He that believeth on 
the Son hath eternal life." That suggests its 
source, but does not define it. Seven times in 
First John alone we run across the expressions, 
"being born again," "born from above," "born 
anew," "begotten of God." All these point to 
the origin of life, but they do not define it. 
109 



^he Gate to the Gospel 



"You hath He made alive." That indicates it 's 
from God, but there is no definition in it. ' 1 Christ 
liveth in me." That again points to God as its 
source, but does not hint at definition. Life is 
not precept, or right living, or influence, or ex- 
ample. These are very desirable, but these are 
the effects of life. 

What do we know about life? The great 
Gordian Knot that all scientists have vainly 
tried to cut for centuries has been, "Whence 
life?" Some years ago the great Lord Kelvin, 
of England, cried, "I have solved it; life came 
to this planet, fell on this planet from some 
other planet." But he had solved nothing, for 
scarcely was the declaration out of his mouth 
than it was spoiled by the question, "How did 
life get on that other planet?" Little do we 
know about life; there is only one thing we do 
know — that it has to be given. There is no 
such thing as spontaneous generation in the 
physical world. Hseckel found that out to his 
mortification. Life had to be given to Adam; it 
has to be given to every plant, to every man. 
Spontaneous generation is not true in the phys- 
ical world; it 's not true in the spiritual world. 
110 



Everlasting Life 



Life has to be given. The Christian life is a 
gift. "He that hath the Son, hath life." "I 
am come that you might have life." "In Him 
was life." Life — all life, Christian life, eternal 
life, has to be given, and there is but one source 
— God. "This is life eternal, that we may 
know Thee, the only true God." If we do n't 
know God, we have not eternal life. Two men 
walk side by side. One possesses eternal life, 
the other does not. How came the one into the 
possession? Are these two men in the same 
school, only in different grades? They are not. 
The man who possesses eternal life and the man 
who does not possess it, live in two different 
worlds; and the passing from one into the other 
is not a matter of graduation, but re-creation. 
We are not promoted, but born into eternal life. 
It is not attained, but imparted. It is not the 
product of culture or training, but of a new seed 
implanted. It is not the old life changed, but a 
new life begun. How may we come in possession 
of it? "The free gift of God is eternal life in 
Christ Jesus our Lord." While "the wages of 
sin is death," eternal life is a free gift, not earned, 
not bought, not bargained for, but given free 
111 



^he Gate to the Gospel 



and freely. "Blessed are the poor." "And this 
is life eternal, that they may know Thee, the 
only true God and Jesus Christ whom Thou 
hast sent." Life — eternal life is from God, by 
God, and through God, and with God forever. 

"With God." That must have been what 
Paul meant when he said, " I long to depart and 
to be with Christ." That 's what Stephen must 
have had in heart when he looked up and cried, 
"Lord Jesus, receive me." Old John Knox, the 
old hero of the sixteenth century, the Bismarck 
of his time, the Savonarola of Scotland, the man 
who feared not the face of man nor of queen, in 
his last hours, when so weak he could not speak, 
a friend said to him, "Have you hope?" And 
he lifted his long finger and pointed up, pointed 
up to life eternal with God. "Shall not perish, 
but have everlasting life." 

John 3:16! O this verse of verses, this 
gospel in a nutshell, this Bible in twenty-five 
words. It begins with God and ends with 
eternal life. Not eternal life insurance, but 
eternal life. Through this verse, God does His 
best with our lame language to show us our- 
selves, lost sinners, perishing, and to show us 
112 



Everlasting Life 



Himself and the way back to Him. This verse 
bridges the chasm between the worlds; it 's the 
ladder up which sinful men may climb to God. 
He that does n't find God through this verse, 
will never find Him. Some years ago, while 
doing evangelistic work in a Western college, one 
evening I heard a knock at my door, and in 
walked a young man whose face I recalled hav- 
ing seen in the meetings. He told me his name, 
and before I could ask anything further, he also 
told me the story of his life. He was born in 
the southern part of Texas. His father died 
when he was six months of age; his mother was 
a Catholic. When eleven years old he ran 
away from home, and for seven years he had 
floated all over several Western States, and at 
last drifted into this college. The next morning 
when we went down to the city, he showed me 
many saloons, gambling dens, and worse places 
of vice, where he spent many hours, many 
nights after the Faculty were asleep. He was 
wrecked body and soul. Looking into his face, 
I said, "Do you mean to tell me that you want 
to be a Christian?" for he had said he wanted 
to be. And then I showed him the hard side of 
8 113 



^he Gate to the Gospel 



the Christian life, and said, "It means some- 
thing for a boy who has been doing the things 
you have for seven years to live a Christian 
life." The harder I made it, the more he shook 
his head and said, "I do n't care what it costs, 
I have got to have it." 

I am sure I was led to turn to John 3: 16. 
I handed him the Bible and asked him to read 
it. He read it and looked up with such a dis- 
appointed face, and said, "I don't see that 
that means anything." I said : "I did n't expect 
you would. Now read it again, and take out 
'the world' and 'whosoever,' and put in your 
own full name and read it slowly." I could 
never forget how he read it, "God so loved 

Edward Nichols " That seemed to stagger 

him, and he began over again, "God so loved 
Edward Nichols, that He gave His only be- 
gotten Son, that if Edward Nichols should be- 
lieve in Him, Edward Nichols should not perish, 
but have everlasting life." Never can I forget 
how he turned his face up and said, "Well, it 
sounds as though it might mean something 
now." 

I took that wonderful verse and pointed him 
114 



Everlasting Life 



away to Calvary, and tried to show him what 
Christ had done for him. I then said, "We will 
pray, you will pray." We knelt and I waited 
for him to begin, but he did not begin. I opened 
my eyes, and he was hunting for John 3: 16, 
and when he found it he put his finger on it 
and prayed. Through all the eternities I could 
never forget that prayer: "0 God! I am not 
fit for You to look upon, but You say in this 
place where I have my finger that if I come You 
will take me. I do come, and O! I do want You 

to take me, and " And just then he broke 

off praying and burst out laughing. I looked 
up, and his face — it looked as though God had 
pushed back the gates and let all the glories of 
Heaven flood it. I said, "What has happened?" 
And he said, "I have just found out what 
John 3: 16 means." It means if you will open 
the door of your heart and let this verse flood 
you, it will flood you with everlasting life; yea, 
with life everlasting. 

"For God so loved the world that He gave 
His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth 
in Him should not perish, but have everlasting 
life." 

115 



"THE CONCLUSION OF THE 
WHOLE MATTER" 



"All hail the power of Jesus' name! 
Let angels prostrate fall; 
Bring forth the royal diadem, 
And crown Him Lord of all. 

"Crown Him, ye morning stars of light, 
Who fixed this earthly ball; 
Now hail the Strength of Israel's might, 
And crown Him Lord of all. 

"O that with yonder sacred throng 
We at His feet may fall! 
We '11 join the everlasting song, 
And crown Him Lord of all." 



"THE CONCLUSION OF THE 
WHOLE MATTER" 



Colossians 3: 11 f "Christ is all and in all." 



EVER was sublimer Scripture written than 



1 ~ the six simple monosyllables of this text. 
From Moses to John, holy men have been dip- 
ping their pens deep in the ink of inspiration to 
tell the world what Christ is. Moses called Him 
Holiness; Jeremiah, Lord; Daniel, Wisdom; Sol- 
omon, Mercy; Job, Redeemer; Matthew, Jesus; 
John, Light. All these told much about Him, 
but all alike failed to strike the word that could 
encompass Him. More than sixty thousand 
volumes have been written descriptive of the 
Christ. But all sixty thousand of them have n't 
described Him. What Christ is can't be told in 
volumes. There is but one thing that can fully 
tell what He is, and that Paul struck in this 
text, and that is a three-lettered monosyllable, 
"all." What is Christ? Simply all. In power, 
He is all powerful; in wisdom, all wise; in exist- 
ence, everywhere present, all present^ Go into 




119 



^he Gate to the Gospel 



any realm, terrestrial or celestial, human or 
divine, and behold Christ is supreme; or, as 
Paul puts it in his text, He is all and in all. 

In aesthetics, think of everything that is 
beautiful, multiply that by infinity, and that is 
the beauty of Christ. Fair is the rising sun, fair 
the blue sea, but fairer than all is He. In ethics, 
think of everything that is good and pure, mul- 
tiply that by infinity, and that is the goodness 
of Christ. In power — we say such a man is a 
power in the intellectual world, another in the 
social, political, but behold how each is limited 
to his own little world. But to Christ all power 
given in Heaven and in earth. In zoology, we 
say the horse is beautiful, the eagle swift, the 
tiger powerful, but more swift and beautiful and 
powerful than all these is the Lion of the tribe 
of Judah, which is the Lamb of God. With 
Miller, give yourself to a study of the rocks 
until your enthusiasm becomes white-heat over 
the old red sandstone, then bow ye low and 
hear that the only rock never split by volcano 
is the Rock of Ages. You will need to build on 
that if you are going to stand. With Gray, lose 
yourself in the world of flowers. Tell to all the 
120 



^he Conclusion of the Whole Matter 



schools that the national flower of Athens is the 
violet; of India, the marigold; of Egypt, the 
heliotrope; of China, the chrysanthemum; then 
tell to all the world that the national flower of 
the universe is the Lily of the Valley, which is 
another spelling for the Christ of God. With 
David, go from star to star, mark the path of 
the Pleiades, the home of Orion, the beauty of 
Arcturus — then be blinded by the one Star that 
outshines all stars, the Star of Bethlehem, the 
Light of the World. Wherever you go, behold 
this text is emblazoned in letters of fire, so that 
the man who runs can read, " Christ is all in all." 

Sometimes we talk about historians, and it 's 
Herodotus, the father of history; Thucidides, the 
immortal historian; Prescott, the blind histo- 
rian. They are historians, but He over whose 
divine head all history breaks into two parts, 
A. D. and B. C, He is history. Sometimes we 
talk about conquerors, and we have in mind 
Caesar, who subdued a part of Gaul; Hannibal, 
who subdued a part of Europe; Alexander, who 
subdued a part of Asia; Pompey, who subdued 
a pa<rt of Africa. But He is the Conqueror 
who shall not subdue a part, but who shall 
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^he Gate to the Gospel 



go from victory unto victory, until He has 
piled all kingdoms under His feet. Then He 
shall reign for ever and ever, while angels crown 
Him "Lord of lords and King of kings." 

Men have tried to name Him; inspired men 
gave Him two hundred and fifty-eight names. 
But all two hundred and fifty -eight of them 
don't fully name Him, for His is "the name 
that is above every name." Artists have tried 
to paint Him. Da Vinci painted a Christ. The 
world looked, the world admired, then the 
world dropped its head in disappointment, for 
he had painted an Italian Christ. Titian 
painted Him; his was a Venetian Christ. Diirer, 
his was a German Christ; Matsys, his was a 
Flemish Christ; Schaeffer, his was an American 
Christ. They all painted a Christ, they all 
alike failed to paint The Christ. He is not 
Italian, nor Venetian, nor Flemish, nor Amer- 
ican. He 's not the Christ of the Jew nor the 
Greek nor the bond nor the black nor the white. 
He is the one universal Christ of all climes and 
all times; He can't be painted. We might as 
well give it up first as last ; there is no use trying 
to scale the skies nor delve the deeps, to find 
122 



^he Conclusion of the Whole Matter 



anything_that is like this Christ nor anything 
that He is like, for He is the Great Unlike. It is 
simply Jesus, the Name high over all in Heaven 
or earth or sea. With Paul, we might as well 
fall down and cry out, "Christ, the all and in all." 

Christ is all; that is, everything to three 
kinds of people. First, to lost people. It 's a 
familiar story, the woman who, overtaken by 
the freezing storm, stripped herself of her 
clothes, wrapped them around her babe and — 
died. But she saved the child. Beautiful! 
But she did it for her child. Christ stripped 
Himself and received in His bare bosom the 
storm of all men's sins. And He did it for His 
children? Ah! He did it for those who pushed 
Him up upon the cross while He did it, who 
pressed down on His brow their crown of thorns, 
who cursed Him while He died. 

"Well might the sun in darkness hide, 
And shut his glories in, 
When Christ, the Mighty Maker, died 
For man the creature's sin." 

The prophet tells us that His visage was 
more marred than that of any man's. How so? 
Benjamin Brewster's face was scarred to the 
123 



^he Gate to the Gospel 



bones. When a little boy, playing with his 
sister, her clothes caught on fire; he tried to 
put them out, and his hands and face were 
marred and scarred for life. Christ rushed 
through the flames for our rescue, flames that 
tore across His brow, flames that gnawed His 
flesh and drank up His blood. No wonder Isaiah 
says, "He is without form or comeliness, and 
when you see Him there is no beauty about 
Him, that you would desire Him." (Isa. 53 : 4, 5.) 

John tells us His hair is white. Whitened 
how? Whitened alone at midnight on the frosty 
mountain praying for you ; whitened alone fight- 
ing back the wild billows of Galilee that you 
might have a peaceful voyage heavenward ; whit- 
ened alone dying, smitten, bleeding, abandoned. 
Can you grasp it? Hair white, visage marred, 
hands scarred, heart broken, feet spiked for lost 
souls. 

He is also everything for lost souls, in the 
salvation He has provided. I mean by that 
simply, it is a salvation that saves the worst to 
the uttermost. And that 's a salvation that 
sweeps us all in. It 's a wonderful salvation 
that can save the blackest African, the reddest 
124 



'Uhe Conclusion of the Whole Matter 



Indian, the brownest South Sea Islander, the 
yellowest Japanese, and the whitest Caucasian 
with the blackest heart. The name Lincoln 
will be forever the synonym of patriotism; 
Cuvier, of science; Louis, of letters; Stuart, of 
royalty; Rothschild, of wealth; but the name 
Christ will for ever and ever be the synonym of 
salvation. That 's the meaning of His name — 
"Thou shalt call His name Jesus, for He shall 
save the people." 

"I 'm a poor sinner, and nothing at all 
But Jesus Christ is my all in all." 

He is everything to troubled people. Two 
things are true of all who read these words: 
you have all had plenty of trouble, and you all 
need help. With David, many have cried, "All 
Thy waves and Thy billows have gone over 
me." To many, the longest word in the lan- 
guage and the word that seems sharpened on 
the grindstone of eternal night, and the word 
that has been thrust deeper into the marrow of 
your souls than all other words, is this word 
trouble. To rid themselves of trouble, how men 
have fought and bled and died. Many, to rid 
125 



^he Gate to the Gospel 



themselves of trouble, have fallen under a wine 
cup, thinking they would drown it. Lo! they 
drowned themselves. Others have fallen into 
sin, and that has been a fall to death. A few 
others, under the crushing load of trouble, have 
fallen to their knees. And for the first time, a 
voice has broken out of the darkness, "The 
mountains may depart and the hills be removed 
into the sea, but My loving kindness shall never 
depart from thee." 

Dr. Dio Lewis tells us in his boyhood home 
there was great trouble — that his father lost his 
memory, that is, he forgot everything but drink, 
drink — that he thought of morning, noon, and 
night. His mother would stagger under the load 
for days, and then she would drag her limbs up 
the narrow stairs into the garret, and out of the 
darkness the children would hear her cry: " O 
Lord, how long? Help me, help me!" And 
then her voice would die away in the distance 
and there would be a long quiet in the garret. 
By and by they would hear her steps coming 
down quick and fast, and when she opened the 
stair door her face would look as though it had 
been immersed in water ; it looked also as though 
126 



^he Conclusion of the Whole Matter 



it had been immersed in glory, for it shone like 
the face of an angel. What did Mrs. Lewis find 
in the garret amid the cobwebs and dirt and 
darkness? She found Him who is everything to 
a troubled soul. 

"Just when your way is roughest, 

Your feet all bruised and torn, 
Your back crushed with burdens 

So long and wearily borne, 
You will find that your way grows smoother, 

The mountains and hills recede, 
And there is rest and refreshment 

To meet your hour of need," 

if you fly to Him. O, fly to Him! 

He is everything to dying people. There 
are two kinds of dying people: One, where 
undoubtedly Christ is present; the other, where 
there is at least a question whether He is present. 
When Hannah More was dying she said three 
words, "Light, light, light!" Then she went up 
on wings of light to the city of light. A neighbor 
of Hannah More's died near the same time, 
and made all hideous about him with his cry, 
"It 's so black, so black." How do you explain 
the difference? It 's only a question of pluck, 
backbone, you say. It is? Hannah More was 
127 



^he Gate to the Gospel 



half scared to death at the sight of a little mouse. 
Her neighbor was the boasted bully and infidel 
of the county, bragging that there was no God, 
man, or devil that he was afraid of. The only 
rational explanation to a reasonable mind is, 
Christ was with Hannah More. I wonder 
whether He was with her infidel neighbor? 
What a sharp contrast between the last hour of 
good General Havelock, dying in India, and the 
great infidel of Havelock's own land, dying at 
the same time on a bed of down! Havelock, 
dying, said to his son, 1 1 Come, my boy, see how 
the Lord helps a child of His to die." And he 
was gone. The great infidel, dying, cried, 
"Demons haunt me, devils taunt me, don't 
let me go." But he plunged off somewhere. 
The only rational explanation to a reasonable 
mind is, Christ was with the good general; I 
wonder whether He was with the great agnostic? 
A young wife, dying, shouted, "I 'm so happy, 
so happy! Jesus is so precious, so precious!" 
Thou, Jesus, stand by us when we come down to 
the last day, the last hour, the last minute, the 
second — gone — whither? It all depends on 
whether you have Him or not. 

128 



^he Conclusion of the Whole Matter 



What a Christ! Who can describe Him? 

Not angel nor archangel, not the one hundred 

and forty-four thousand who, day and night, 

around His throne, chant His glory. Such a 

Christ, with feet lacerated for the world's rescue, 

heart-broken for the world's sins, hands bleeding 

for the world's uplifting. Such a Christ, with a 

heart full of hope, happiness, and Heaven. 

Such a Christ, with hands outstretched ready to 

let fall upon you pardon, peace, and purity. 

Hallelujah! what a Savior! 

" I entered once a home of care, 
For age and penury were there, 

But peace and joy withal; 
I asked the lonely woman whence 
Her helpless widowhood's defense, 
She told me, 'Christ was all.' 

" I stood beside a dying bed, 
Where lay a wife with aching head, 

Waiting for Jesus' call. 
I watched her smile — 't was sweet as May — 
And as her spirit winged away, 

She whispered, 'Christ is all.' 

" I dreamed that hoary time had fled, 
And earth and sea gave up their dead, 

A fire dissolved this ball. 
I saw the Church's ransomed throng, 
I heard the burden of their song, 
'T was, 'Christ is all in all.' 

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The Gate to the Gospel 



" Then come to Christ, O! come to-day, 
The Father, Son, and Spirit say, 

The bride repeats the call. 
His blood will cleanse your guilty stain, 
His love will soothe your weary pain, 

For 'Christ is all in all.' " 



130 



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